Mapping Sydney Universities

Posted: Tuesday 19 May 2015

As a current university student, I've always had second thoughts about the university that I'm in. Of course, this is all natural for a first year indecisive undergrad, however even if I do decide to stay, it wouldn't hurt to go exploring other university campuses.

But where are all the universities hidden away in Sydney?

The University of Sydney (USyd)

Note the size of the Campus. In fact, the University of Sydney is an amalgamation of multiple Campuses throughout New South Wales. Zoom out to gain a perspective on how large USyd really is.


The University of Technology, Sydney (UTS)

UTS appears to encompass two distinct campuses. The main campus in the city, and a secondary campus in a more secluded area. Zooming into the main campus reveals that UTS is quite small in comparison to USyd's main campus, however multiple-storied buildings make up for this shortfall.


Macquarie University (MQ)


MQ appears to be a single, closely accessible "university in a campus", It seems to be encapsulated by a diamond perimeter, and is surrounded by a rather majestic national park - which is given, considering the isolation of MQ to the other "Sydney" universities. It might be worthwhile to check out MQ one day - it's a sure refreshing change from the concrete and glass buildings of USyd and UTS.



The University of Western Sydney (UWS)


UWS seems to be very dispersed and disorganized. However, each campus should present a unique and pleasantly surprising experience. I would like to note as well, that data was quite hard to obtain, due to most being locked up in PDF files.



The University of New South Wales (UNSW)


Surprisingly, data was very difficult to obtain from UNSW. But as you can see in the map below, UNSW has multiple campuses distributed around Sydney's East (particularly near coastal suburbs). Zoom out far enough and UNSW even has a campus over at Canberra!



A Merged Map

There are more universities in Sydney, however data would be near-impossible to automatically obtain.
With all of this data on Universities already, it would make sense to map them all into one map.
And so here it is!




Bonus

Here's some data on USyd (namely, the locations [as in latitude and longitude] of USyd all buildings), in case you're interested in using it for geospatial mapping/data visualization.

https://gist.github.com/extramaster/0fb168bdf78986abf164

A KML file for USyd buildings (with building images [note I do not own these images]) can be found here:
https://gist.github.com/extramaster/de0b4e94c85107491d51 - USyd.kml

A direct link to the Google Maps page for USyd can be found here:
https://www.google.com/maps/d/u/0/viewer?mid=zIxh4J-dsNwo.k3_GG2bUO5tM - USyd List of Buildings