I have recently become enamored of Gothamist Lab's Map. They've tied into the NYPD, FDNY, and EMS information systems to produce a more-or-less real time map of the major police, fire, and medical events in New York.

Those of you who were here during previous city administrations know how worldchanging, indeed earthshaking, this development is. Past crime statistics were difficult enough to come by -- as for real time events, fugeddaboutit! But someone in the higher echelons of the current city government must have caught the wave and decided that it was better to make this stuff available than to keep it hidden. The Gothamist people have put it to good use.