Rat-Town, Massachusetts

A new interactive map of Boston seems to indicate that Beantown has become Rat-town. Rats! Boston shows rat sightings around the Massachusetts city made by concerned citizens.

Self-appointed Rat Czar Viviano Cantu is using 311 reports to map all the recent sightings of rats around Boston. The sightings are taken from non-emergency 311 calls to the city. The Rats! Boston map also shows the locations of other critters. It doesn't just visualize the locations of rat reports to the city. It also tracks 311 sightings of other animals in Boston. For example on Arlington Street someone seems to have spotted a race between a hare and a tortoise.

It turns out that this isn't an urban re-enactment of Aesop's famous Fable, but is instead two separate reports of a pet turtle spotted in the park and a dead rabbit found on Arlington Street. In fact a lot of the reports to Rats! Boston concern dead animals. On first viewing the map I was intrigued why there were so many reports of pigeon sightings - which is surely not that much of a rare occurrence to necessitate a call to the local authorities. Apparently these are all reports of dead birds that residents want the city to remove.

The law of unintended consequences does suggest that creating a map of 311 reports is not always a good idea. For example Jennifer Wong's map (Human) Wasteland, which tracked 311 calls in San Francisco of 'human waste or urine' quickly became a reference call for loony right-wingers in their irrational hatred of San Francisco. Jennifer's map was created to highlight the issue of homelessness in San Francisco. Unfortunately for many on the right a concern for the plight of the homeless falls a long way below their hatred of liberals. 

It would be a shame if Viviano Cantu's map fell to a similar plight, for example by some idiot re-naming Boston 'Rat-Town, Massachusetts'.