By Laura Foy
If you’ve ever subscribed to a rare bird alert notification, you’ll be all too familiar with descriptions like this, “Travel west 2/3rd of the way down Army Camp Road from Hwy 21, look for orange flagging tape on the fence on your left. Look for hydro pole 2146.” It gets even worse if there’s no roads involved, “5 in weedy areas near flooded fields, 2 at least along trail behind pond (north side toward transmission tower).”
These descriptions are somehow overly wordy while at the same time being imprecise.
Enter what3words, a geocoding system that breaks the world down into 3 m squares and assigns each square a unique three-word address. For instance, the front door to the Ojibway Nature Centre is located at ///rattler.whistle.dust. The bird blind at Hillman Marsh is at ///chicken.garments.good. The Serengeti Tree at Point Pelee is at ///feasting.pitted.bypasses.
Land-based what3words addresses are available in more than 45 different languages. In English the algorithm uses 20,000 words in a pseudo-random distribution to try and avoid similar words and homophones from ending up too nearby to one another. Once an address is identified, the app will integrate with Google Maps or your chosen navigation system to provide turn-by-turn directions. For off-road locations, the app has a built-in compass mode. The app can even be used without an internet connection.
The UK-based company was initially launched in 2013 but has been gaining mainstream recognition in the last few years. More than 85% of emergency services in the UK now use what3words to help coordinate their responses for situations like wilderness rescues. Dozens of services across Canada have also adopted the system, including the Ontario Provincial Police. Mercedes-Benz, Ford, Triumph Motorcycles and Lamborghini have all integrated what3words into their navigation systems. The country of Mongolia has even adopted the system in place of postal addresses!
The system’s usefulness extends to conservation and citizen science applications. The Tees Rivers Trust accepts user reports of giant hogweed in the form of what3words addresses to target and control the invasive species. Endangered species can be similarly reported. Organizations can use it for volunteers to join a remote tree planting, find parking, locate a trailhead, designate accessible entrances, and pinpoint bathroom locations (particularly if they are temporary).
While it probably won’t supplant the more technical uses of GPS, it does make it far easier to communicate hard-to-describe locations. From now on, you’ll see me popping up in your rare bird alerts using what3words addresses.
The free app is available for iPhone and Android. For more information or to use the service via their website, visit https://what3words.com/.
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