In This Issue

• Using Journal Content for Teaching Purposes
• Westmount Book Launch
  
• Historical Street Map Project
• Library Staff Member Receives the 2011 Waterloo Award
• The Encyclopedia of Mathematics & Society
  
• New GIS Data Resources
  
• Guide to Evaluating Information Sources
  
• Extended Hours at the Davis Centre and Dana Porter Libraries
• Introducing Gayle Bushell
• Introducing Rachel McNeil
• The Library Channel
  

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Historial Street Map Project

Map Library staff have created a historical street map of the Region of Waterloo that lets users explore changes in city boundaries, urban growth, and the street network as far back as 1955.

Already drawing the attention of the Daily Bulletin and The Record, the historical street map is the second phase of the Map Library’s project which commenced in 2008 with the digitization and georeferencing of over 2,000 historical air photos of the Region of Waterloo.

The historical street map for 1955 is available to download in the user-friendly KML format and is viewable in Google Earth.

Some of the more interesting observations library staff have made analyzing the historical street map include:

• Urban built-up areas expanded dramatically in the past half century
  • Urban built-up area increased by 537%, from 38km2 in 1955 to 202 km2 in 2011. The rapid urban expansion mostly occurred in the suburbs.
• A significant increase of the road network in the suburbs
  • Between 1955 and 2011, the total road length for the Region of Waterloo has increased from 2175 km to 3626 km, an increase of 66%.
  • Most of the new roads were built in the suburban areas of Cambridge, Kitchener and Waterloo (from 813 km to 2073 km).
  • There is an increase of 155% more total road length in the Tri-Cities, whereas only 14% in the township areas.

• Many country and farm roads either disappeared or changed shape.
• In built-up areas, the street network largely remains the same, however some street names have changed
  • Part of University Avenue was named Dearborn Street, located across the south campus (Dana Porter Library, Needles Hall) until Ring Road.
  • Street name changes were necessary when two country roads were connected to create a new road.

• Having historical street names available allows one to pinpoint historical locations like the boardroom of Waterloo College at Dearborn & Albert
• New roads were built in the rural areas along rural/farm roads. Sometimes a small part of these old roads remains today as trails

The Street Map files were created by using a GIS program to analyze the street network visible in the 1955 air photos. Instead of manually drawing the streets in, staff worked with a 2010 street network map as a baseline, and deleted all newer streets and then recreated the historical ones. Street names were assigned to the street files by checking against a georeferenced 1955 Kitchener and Waterloo city map.

For more maps and highlights of historical changes in the Cities of Kitchener and Waterloo, visit the Map Libraries Waterloo County Historical Street Project Website.

You may also download the KML files and view the streets in Google Earth to accurately compare the past and the present.

By Eva Dodsworth and Steve Xu

For more information, contact:

Geospatial Data Services Librarian
Ext. 36931

GIS Library Associate
Ext. 38985

University of Waterloo Library
200 University Avenue West
Waterloo, Ontario, Canada N2L 3G1
519 888 4883

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