Simple Map Making With Google Fusion Tables

A quicker than quick recipe to make a map from a list of addresses in a simple text file using Google Fusion tables…

Here’s some data (grabbed from The Gravesend Reporter via this recipe) in a simple two column CSV format; the first column contains address data. Here’s what it looks like when I import it into Google Fusion Tables:

Now let’s map it:-)

First of all we need to tell the application which column contains the data we want to geocode – that is, the addrerss we want Fusion Tables to find the latitude and longitude co-ordinates for…

Then we say we want the column to be recognised as a column type:

Computer says yes, highlighting the location type cells with a yellow background:

As if by magic a Map tab appears (though possibly not if you are using Google Fusion Tables as apart of a Google Apps account…) The geocoder also accepts hints, so we can make life easier for it by providing one;-)

Once the points have been geocoded, they’re placed onto a map:

We can now publish the map in preparation for sharing it with the world…

We need to change the visibility of the map to something folk can see!

Public on the web, or just via a shared link – your choice:

Here’s my map:-)

The data used to generate this map was originally grabbed from the Gravesend Reporter: Find your polling station ahead of the Kent County Council elections. A walkthrough of how the data was prepared can be found here: A Simple OpenRefine Example – Tidying Cut’n’Paste Data from a Web Page.