Waldo Smeets .com

The Dutch province of Groningen has launched a Risk Assessment Application. The primary purpose of the product is to allow citizens to estimate the risk involved with installations (gas stations, chemical factories, etc.) in their living area, using the rich interface of an interactive topographical map. This Rich Internet Application is very intuitive with it’s 3 main draggable sections “Navigation”, “Map” and a “Legenda”. The legenda can be customized to define which risk-causing installations and which sensitive buildings should be displayed on the map.

Interesting to know is the background of this application; 3 years ago a huge explosion in a fireworks company destroyed a complete building block and killed several people. It appeared that lots of citizens where not aware of the excistance of such a dangourous location, so close to where they live. The political consequences have lead to legislation requiring local governement to inform citizens and enforce safety procedures to a higher degree. In order for citizens to know the possible dangers of their surrounding area, the Province of Groningen asked Macromedia Partner theFactor.e to create a platform for communication in a visual, user friendly and meaningful way about this subject.

Detail: when you zoom in to 500% on an object, you can see the actual blast radius of a possible explosion at a certain installation!