One of my hobbies is hiking. I live in Phoenix, where several mountain preserves boast a network of city-wide trails. Along the trail, we have favorite restaurants we stop at for brunch or a beer after our hike.

I hadn’t equated this routine with place-making.

A community in Scotland has.

The Cateran Common Wealth maps existing cultural sites along a trail that circles the community.

This project expands the notion of place-making from a solitary public space to network of public locations.

By employing  a creative commons tool – Open Street Map – Cateran Common Wealth demonstrates an approach to place-making that is available to everyone.

Extracted from http://commonculture.org.uk/about-the-project/the-cateran-trail/

The Cateran Trail is a fully waymarked walk of 64 miles (103 km) that lies at the heart of Scotland, approximately 60 miles north of Edinburgh, 17 miles north west of Dundee and 21 miles north east from Perth.

A circular route, the Trail has no real beginning or end and takes its name from the Caterans (most likely taken from the Gaelic ‘ceathaime’ meaning ‘common people’), the feared cattle thieves who raided the rich lands of Strathardle, Glenshee and Glen Isla.

Extracted from http://commonculture.org.uk/about-the-project/cateran-map/

We’ve begun a mapping exercise to identify all the people and organisations working with arts, culture and heritage around the Cateran Trail who might get involved in helping us develop the programme and make it happen and we’ve already found over 136. If you zoom in on the map below you will see where everyone is located, together with a little bit of information about them and a link to their website where they have one. The red line is the Cateran Trail.

Extracted from http://commonculture.org.uk/events/whats-planned/

Starting in  2016 and running through 2017 and probably into 2018, all around the Cateran Trail, you will be able to experience arts, cultural and heritage activities & events which will inspire you to think about & celebrate our ‘common wealth’.

Photo by giovanni.k