This course introduced participants to the ArcGIS mapping software in the context of crime analysis. The course began with an introduction to the ArcGIS software and the different tools that are available for analysing spatial data and drawing maps. In the final parts of the course, participants obtained publicly available crime data (from www.police.uk) and used this to identify and map crime hotspots. Participants were also welcome to bring their own data with them for mapping/analysis.

Course outline

  1. 1.An Introduction to ArcCatalogue
  2. 2.An Introduction to ArcMap
  3. 3.Mapping with ArcMap
  4. 4.Using the Layout View
  5. 5.Adding Base Maps
  6. 6.Working with Tables
  7. 7.Bringing Crime Data into ArcMap
  8. 8.Querying Crime Data
  9. 9.Identifying and Mapping Hotspots

About the course leaders

Alison is a Lecturer in Geocomputation in the School of Geography at the University of Leeds. Her interests are in the application of artificial intelligent solutions for geographical problems, with applied research experience in the development and linkage of novel methodologies for a variety of socio-economic applications including education planning/management, retail analysis and crime. A particular focus of her work is in individual based modelling, in particular the development and application of agent-based modelling and microsimulation. Alison has extensive experience in the use of advanced spatial analysis tools and GIS.

Nick is a Lecturer in GIS in the School of Geography, University of Leeds.  His primary research interests are in developing spatial computer models of social phenomena and his focus, in particular, has been on crime simulation. He is also involved in developing web-based tools and techniques that can be used by researchers to publish models online; allowing them to be used by other researchers and by policy makers.

TALISMAN is a node of the National Centre for Research Methods (NCRM) and is funded through the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) as part of a strategy to improve the standard of research methods across the UK social science community. TALISMAN is based at the University of Leeds and University College London. Please visit www.geotalisman.org for more information.