PhillyHistory Mobile gives Philadelphia residents and visitors the ability to access more than 41,800 historic and cultural photos with simply a cell phone or wireless Internet-equipped device. The new, innovative, geographically searchable mobile Web site has an easy-to-use search screen where users can enter an address, intersection, keyword, or historic date for nearby historic or cultural sites. The resulting display returns a map of the area showing coordinates for various historic and cultural assets in close proximity, accompanied by photos of those assets.
PhillyHistory Mobile is made possible by Sajara, a Web server-based geographic information system (GIS) application and digital asset management software product created by Philadelphia-based Avencia, Inc. Built on ESRI’s ArcGIS Server and ArcIMS software, Sajara allows the Philadelphia Department of Records (DoR) to manage, update, and record metadata pertaining to each image in the city’s photo archive. By uploading images, entering metadata, and assigning map coordinates to the images via Sajara’s flexible geocoding function, PhillyHistory Mobile gives users the ability to view photos of their geographic location dating back, in some instances, to the mid-nineteenth century.
"The PhillyHistory project has been a truly groundbreaking effort to create a whole new way of accessing historic material," says Robert Cheetham, president and CEO of Avencia. "It represents a convergence of technologies and opportunities. ESRI’s products, Avencia’s Sajara software, the Philly Wi-Fi initiative, and the increasing number of Internet-enabled phones and handheld computers have been brought together to provide additional texture to our experience of the city."
PhillyHistory Mobile is an extension of PhillyHistory.org, the framework from which the mobile version is built. Developed by Avencia in 2004 to help the city preserve its deteriorating and aging photographic memories, PhillyHistory.org attracts thousands of unique visitors each month. Its e-commerce module supports funding of the project and creates revenue through the sale of prints and digital photos. PhillyHistory Mobile is a tool to support the city’s tourism industry and to increase traffic to the Web site’s growing e-commerce store. New images from the city’s estimated two million photos are uploaded and viewable from both PhillyHistory media at an approximate rate of two thousand per month.
"There is enormous potential for this sort of platform beyond the historic photos and maps in the PhillyHistory project," says Cheetham. "It can be applied to cultural resources, tours, real estate, and environmental information."
To take a mobile tour of Philadelphia’s past from a handheld computer or other mobile device, visit mobile.phillyhistory.org. For more information on ESRI’s products and services, go to www.esri.com.
Source: ESRI
