Putting our stories on the map: Participatory mapping and popular education for environmental justice in freight transport-impacted communities in the San Francisco Bay Area

Mapping technologies are increasingly recognized for their ability to document and display environmental justice and community health issues. Yet mapping technologies do not necessarily lend themselves to a popular education process, understood by many community-based organizations as an essential approach to building community power to effect and sustain positive change. Popular education is a process by which the people most affected by an issue reflect on their lived experience and generate a greater understanding of their collective challenges and power. Developing techniques to adapt mapping to reflect the principles of popular education will enable practitioners to better utilize mapping to achieve environmental justice. In this presentation, we reflect on our recent experience facilitating community mapping activities in Richmond, San Francisco, and Oakland, California, with residents concerned about the health impacts of freight transport in their communities. We describe the goals and approach of the mapping workshops and how they fit into a larger process of building leadership and organization. We discuss the workshop activities and methods used, and how we see them reflecting the principles of popular education pedagogy.