Maia Williams

Maia Williams photo


I am a spatial data specialist based in Perth, Western Australia. This page is a collection of personal and professional projects.

I enjoy the diversity of contexts and multidisciplinary opportunities my spatial data work affords me. I thrive on continual learning and teaching of spatial analysis possibilities and the pleasures of new tricks!

I am excited by open source projects like QGIS, OpenStreetMap, Wikidata and many more from the FOSS4G world.

Resume
LinkedIn profile
OpenStreetMap
Wikimedia projects

Dissertations, publications and university projects

Master of Landscape Architecture dissertation by design, University of Western Australia, 2020

My Master of Landscape Architecture dissertation was about the processes of urban landscape perception and place creation, and how purposefully designing for and with these processes might (positively) influence urban design. The dissertation by design comprises a literature review and discussion of supporting theories (Part 1) and a hypothetical suburb design demonstration (Part 2).

Master of Landscape Architecture design studio, University of Western Australia, 2019

My final year design studio was a combination of data gathering and design using Jan Gehl’s street quality and public life analysis methods (all credit to Pip Munckton and Chantal Caruso for the studio design). Just the right studio for me.

Master of Landscape Architecture unit, University of Western Australia, 2018

As part of a unit on critical theory in landscape architecture I wrote an essay about the processes of place conceptualisation and how successfully landscape architects are using digital approaches to engage with these processes.

Master of Science in Geospatial Technologies, Universidade Nova de Lisboa and Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster, 2011

My dissertation research was about the categories of landforms people identify, and if/why the categories vary between different combinations of landscapes and people. I was studying in Portugal and Germany, and did my dissertation research in Portugal. I published my research in the Journal of Spatial Information Science (JOSIS) and presented at the Geomundus conference in 2011.

Bachelor of Engineering (Environmental) Honours, University of Western Australia, 2006

For the sake of completeness I include my honours dissertation here. I did this project the year after I first began working with spatial data and I was so pleased to find an honours project that was essentially a remote sensing data analysis.

Open source projects

Wikimedia Australia Wikidata Fellowship project, 2022 -

In 2022 I participated in a mentored fellowship focussed on developing a method for the semi-automated use of Wikidata population values in Australian place Wikipedia article infoboxes. With support I developed a Lua module to aid this workflow.

Geogeeks and FOSS4G, 2021 -

I help organise Geogeeks events. Geogeeks is a community group for people interested in open source tools and data for geospatial. We run regular hack nights, speaker events and OpenStreetMap mapping days. There are drinks, pizza, like minded people, urban exploring, nerdy spatial speak - the best!

In 2021 I helped organised the FOSS4G SotM Oceania Perth Hub conference. This was a local event coniciding with other regional Oceania conference hubs. It was fantastic, we’ll do it again one day.

Spatial data resources for landscape architects

Resources developed for UWA landscape architecture students and practising landspace architects/environmental scientists. These documents are a continual work in progress, not yet polished and in need of collation … but often useful. I use these documents when guest teaching at landscape architecture design studios or helping practices with GIS training.