Boston Crime Watch: Google Map Edition

Stop Snitchin’ shirts have reportedly been pulled off the shelves in a number of local stores. Boston Police, with their shiny new blog, apprehended 77 persons on outstanding warrants over the weekend. Crime statistics still say that Boston has hit a ten year high for violent crime, as measured by the murder rate. Bostonist often touts the merits of the libertarian values. Be that as it may we still wonder how 77 people were walking the streets, and apparently pretty easy to find, weren’t picked up earlier. Kathleen O’Toole and Tom Menino are on a crusade for a safer city. The Boston Globe has a mission to plot the ‘Hot Spots’ (we’re not talking wireless), and Adam Gaffin is pinpointing assaults in our own back yard.

Titular head of UniversalHub and Boston-Online, Gaffin created a Google Map mash-up of where, when, and even what type of violent crime occurred. So far the map includes the working data of crimes in Boston in the month of November. Bostonist appreciates the caveats that he’s included on the rough (Alpha, in his words) site launched over the weekend. Trying to pinpoint sites in Boston can be quite a challenge. You need the streets, intersection, and sometimes even the non-existent neighborhood to define where you actually are. Just try to follow Tremont Street from Downtown into Roxbury or Boylston (the one in JP not Back Bay). The crime site, after the first set of revisions, currently contains a number of sub-site maps including crime by neighborhood and city wide maps by crime type. Unfortunately there are too many points to put on one all-inclusive map without a high definition, super density, and wide-screen monitor to view it on.