Nial McSorley and his great Croatian Adventure

Coleraine Borough Council’s Geographic Information System/Web Officer, Nial McSorley has brought gold to the Borough after winning ‘Esri Ireland’s’ Annual Map Challenge. 

The competition, ‘Maps Make Sense for Croatia’ asked entrants to tell a story using web maps and make their story interesting, engaging and compelling. 

Nial’s design, entitled ‘Welcome to the Official North West 200 Mapping Tour’, featured a story map of the International North West 200. Commenting on his achievement and the theory behind his design Nial said, ‘I designed a map which could give users the ability to experience something real. 

“Portstewart is home to the great North West 200 and in designing the optimal interactive map I tried to design something that would be useful and of interest to those who attend the race each year. The map tells a story from the start to the end of the race, with videos and images depicting experiences from each of the race days. 

‘The story map maximises spatial information permitting users to view the data on all platforms, desktop/laptop/iPad and smart phones. It also provides race goers with information on the best vantage points from throughout the race-course in an interactive format. 

‘There are thirteen vantage points along the course, each with a Google street view link. The fourteenth point is an embedded on-board video link lap of the course from YouTube. The story map has links to NW200 Facebook, Twitter and their official website. 

‘I’d like to thank Council for the support and opportunity to work on the project and thank Esri Ireland. I would also like thank the University of Ulster and placement MSc student Sean O Doherty for his work on this project.” 

Read the full press release on Coleraine Borough Council's web site. Nial pictured below at the offices of Coleraine Borough Council with his winning map on screen. Check out Nial's map on the NW200 Race.