The Big Apps Contenders: Exploring NYC

We covered the launch of the Big Apps competition here in NYC back in October. The voting opened this week for the “popular choice” and each day we will take a look at one category. Today’s category is “Exploring NYC“. Remember you are only allowed one vote across all categories so make sure to look at all the apps before casting your vote.

Update: There were two apps I left off this list yesterday. They were created by city workers and aren’t able to win the popular choice prizes but will compete for the “City Talent Award”. I apologize for my mistake in not including them originally.

•  Look into NYC – Combine pertinent data on public and private establishments and/or facilities coming from different NYC agencies into an easy to search web interface.
• New York City Parks and Recreation Online – Overview New York City Parks and Recreation Online (NYCPRO) is a web application that lets you discover parks and recreational opportunities in New York City. You can search for parks by neighborhood, as well as limit your search to certain recreational activities.

Here are the other Exploring NYC apps that can be voted on for the popular choice prizes.

• Digital Boroughs by Geocommons – This application represents various data from the NYC Data Mine in an online atlas. It draws on NASA, Yahoo, Microsoft, Google and OpenStreetMaps tiles as base maps. The data is exportable to various formats including: Google Earth KML, CSV, ESRI Shapefile, JSON, and Spatialite.
• Find My Library – Find My Library is an open source software project with the goal of making it easier for patrons – particularly those with limited access to the Internet from home – to locate a public library in their community.
• Hey Walkies - Make no bones about it, New Yorker’s love their dogs. You’d be hard pressed to walk a block without bumping into a Frenchie, Jack Russell or Labrador hotfooting it to the local doggy park. And it’s not just the pups that are loving their doggy park experience.
• History Bus M22 – History Bus M22 App uses GPS technology to aid NYC tourists and residents in exploring the 22 historic houses in NYC. Using the iPhones built in GPS, the default setting on the App would pinpoint NYC’s 22 historic houses.
• iParks NY, Midtown – Like many New Yorkers we make ample use of the City’s wonderful parks.  Some are great for kids, some are great for adults, there are literally dozens of sites to see in Central Park alone and thousands in the five boroughs at large.
• NY Nyx – New York City. The Big Apple. The City that never sleeps. So much to do and so little time. We can’t help you with your eternal to-do list, but we can help you save some time.
• NYC Greenmarkets – iPhone-based Mobile Guide to Greenmarkets, Farmers, CSAs and Seasonal Produce in New York City Project History: The idea for a “mobile/smartphone guide to all things green and sustainable” is not new.
• NYC Landmarks – NYC Landmarks makes it easy for city residents and visitors to explore the incredible collection of historic districts and individual landmarks in each of the five boroughs. Photographs of each landmark are extracted from Landmark Preservation Commission designation reports.
• NYC Park Events Map – This interactive map lets users learn about New York City’s park events in a new, innovative way.
• NYC Treasure Finder – In city where you can walk around the street and pick up some amazing goods others are just throwing away, there isn’t a centralized place where people can find where, what and when trash and recylables are being collected.
• NYC Way: 30+ NYC iPhone Apps in One – NYC Way is an iPhone application that bundles a variety of NYC resources useful for locals and tourists alike. Experience the power of 30+ NYC related iPhone apps packaged into one. NYC Way is location aware and provides you with information sorted by proximity.
• NYC.ByCycle.info - NYC.ByCycle.info allows users to locate the nearest bike racks to their current detected location or a specified address. Bikers can save time and ensure their bike’s safety by using this tool.
• NYCSamosa - 1. Provide access to City Data via simple mobile Text-Messaging interface. 2. Emphasize ease of use so that requests for data can be made using Natural Language (Ex: “show me interesting events on Tuesday”) 3.  Provide feedback mechanism (much like 311 iPhone App) so that users can report on problems to the city (ex: “Fallen Tree on Broadway and 63rd Street”). This data is saved and can be made available to the City Agencies for use.
• Open Accessible Space Information System – The Open Accessible Space Information System (OASIS) mapping website helps sustain New York City’s open spaces and visualize the nexus between community greening and broader urban planning issues.  It is a richly layered mashup of data from the city, state, and federal government and environmental and community organizations.
• PlayaroundNYC – PlayaroundNYC was created to help New Yorkers see how well their neighborhoods are supported by playgrounds.  It uses walking distance to playgrounds and pollution caused by nearby truck routes to generate an overview of how well different areas of New York City are supported by playgrounds.
• Playground Explorer – An easy way to find local playgrounds, leave comments and rate your favorite playgrounds in nyc.
• Ride the City – Ride the City helps bicyclists find safe bike routes in major cities. Like MapQuest, Google Maps, and other mapping applications, Ride the City finds the shortest distance between two points, with a difference.
• Spokes NYC – Spokes NYC is a free iPhone application for New York City cyclists.  It generates ideal bike routes with turn by turn directions for cyclists within city limits.  Other features include a bike rack locator, bike shop locator, and the ability to report thefts from a given bike rack.
• TAPP NYC – TAPP NYC was conceived and built by 10x Studio in New York City in response to the NYC BigApps competition. New York City has released over a hundred tables of city data for public use — the Datamine. Some of it is banal, some is interesting.
• Taxihack – Taxihack allows users to post live comments on NYC taxis and their drivers via email (alert@taxihack.com) or Twitter (@taxihack). Users send messages to the system, including either the medallion number (like 1A23) or the driver’s number (located on the driver’s id visible in the backseat).
• Trees Near You – Trees Near You (a.k.a. TreesNY) is an iPhone application that helps you learn about more than 500,000 trees that live on New York City sidewalks. For any area of the city, from block to borough, you can see the different species that live there, and calculate the environmental (and monetary!) benefits that these trees provide.
• UpNext 3D NYC – UpNext NYC is an interactive 3D map for exploring and discovering the city on your iPhone.  Experience the Big Apple in full 3D on your phone to quickly and easily find all that the city has to offer.
• Walkshed NYC – Walkshed NY uses 10 data collections drawn from the NYC.gov Data Mine to enable users to create a walkabilty heat map based on individual preferences.
• WayFinder NYC – Find the nearest and best directions to New York City subway and NJ Path stations on your Android phone. Way to go! Wayfinder, NYC’s augmented reality app, is designed to help you locate the subway and PATH stations nearest you.
• Where Brooklyn App – Leveraging the NYC DataMine for Brooklyn points of interest, we have created an application that allows users to tour Brooklyn via Augmented Reality. Through the use of location-based information, users can not only find out relevant points of interest near them, but also share them with their friends over Twitter, Facebook, and Foursquare—thus enabling them to make the simple task of visiting Brooklyn into a social event.