Nym wrote in another BRC / GPS google group:
Anyone and everyone interested in doing GIS activity should really
jump on irc network irc.oftc.net on channel #geo. A bunch of us
geowankers (a friendly term for gis hackers), are on there trying to
get ready for the burn.

I have data, and I'm trying to get permission to share it with others.

The data stays mostly the same every year though. In fact you could say that it's pretty much exactly the same.

Check this out though:
www.mapbureau.com/examples/...ngman2005/

If you want to use this, I'm sure it wouldn't be a problem. It reads GPX files.

Hi, folks!

Playaquest (the person) just let us know about this group. Yay!

I think I can help with the question :)

I've been creating GPS and other maps of Black Rock City since 1999. Currently I do the mapping and GPS support for the BRIDGE system (Black Rock Integrated Directory Geopositioning and Events) which runs out of PlayaInfo and over the WiFi network on playa. Check it out on playa (just come by PlayaInfo). It mixes mapping with pre-filled and user-entered information on theme camps, art installations, individual campers, etc. For example, you can click on an overall map to zoom in on a block, click on a theme camp in that block to bring up the data page on that camp, read their descriptions and announcements, send them messages, etc. Or find your friends, or tell it where to find you.

BRIDGE is mostly oriented towards non-GPS users because they are rather more common on playa; but from the start the intention was to support GPS.

I also generate many GIFs, SVG, and various GPS based maps, with data on the block layout, roads, theme camps, art installations, portapotties, etc. So far the GPS aspect has been mostly distributed to staff but we can open a lot of it up. (Some things we have to delay, like theme camp locations).

There are two kinds of GPS maps generated. The original is a "trackmap", where I use the track facility of almost any GPS with transfer capability to draw the layout of the city (when I started using tracks for this in 1999 it was a novelty). The other form uses the explicit "map" facilities of some Garmin units; this can support a richer set of features, like shaded areas and labels; but it doesn't work on all GPS units. In the latter category there is a "block map" I generate, and a nice "street grid" map that Tzara generates from the gps tracks. He has that available for download now from his own website! I'll let him announce it, tho; beautiful work.

On playa, we can begin to release theme camps and art installations as they are placed; we honor the senior staff needs not to release info too soon (otherwise some people might attempt to place their own theme camps rather than go through the Placers, for example).

This year we expect to have updated GPX format data available on playa through the WiFi network, as well as through coming by the GPS Filling Station at Playa Info (which Tzara has agreed to head up). As we get new data (like the real location of an art installation) it will be made available.

I'm really busy right now, and the data (other than Tzara's map) we do have isn't quite ready to go.

What data would you like? Let's discuss it. What I'd love is to get the data out there and have some knowledgeable GPS folks to enjoy it, enhance it, and teach others. We do need that latter - people to spread it further. Once upon a time only a few of us had a GPSr and we were geeks; it's getting more popular tho and not everybody who has a GPS knows how to make full use of it today.

There is an old demo from 2003 on the web at:

home.comcast.net/~brcmap/gps/

Download some of the data from 2001 or 2003 and try it on your GPS. I'd especially like to hear from users of non-Garmin GPS's (or non-mapping GPS's). Or users running Macs or Linux rather than Microsoft OSs.

Also: I'm thinking to standardize on GPX delivery (see the number of formats on the above page!). Is that reasonable?

Glad to run into you!
Zhahai