Kumiko Yamazaki: “Do your part and keep the community going”

Kumiko Yamazaki* is a tech manager at MapQuest, Inc. in Denver, Colorado. She has spent her entire career in the geospatial industry as a cartographer, GIS analyst, and software engineer. You can follow her on Twitter at @kyamazaki.

Kumiko was interviewed for GeoHipster by Atanas Entchev.

Q: How did you get into GIS?

A: I was always into maps. When I was a kid, I could point out every state/province/prefecture in the U.S., Canada, and Japan, and name all its capitals. Then came naming every country and all of its capitals, major rivers, mountain ranges, and other geographical features. When I went to college, it just felt natural to take a few geography courses and these few courses ended up turning into an entire degree in the field. My cartography and GIS classes were my favorite and I was ready for a career in the mapping industry!

Q: You work for MapQuest (or is it “mapquest”?). Tell us what you do there.

A: I work on the MapQuest developer brand as a part of Verizon Location Services. I’m currently the tech manager for the Developer Services engineering team and we are primarily responsible for all of the API documentation, the provisioning and management of API keys, and our self-serve platform that allows customers to pay for additional usage of our services. All of this can be found at https://developer.mapquest.com.

In general, we’re a very fast-paced team and we jump from one project to another at incredible speed. Some days I feel we’re THE mapping team, but that could just be me forcing my way into tackling more map-related projects.

Prior to this role, however, I’ve also had several other positions at MapQuest which includes being a cartographer, technical writer, and software engineer. There are a few special individuals here who have helped me along the way and I owe everything to them… at least a few beers, anyway.

Q: Tell us about some of the technologies you use at work. Are they mostly open source, or mostly proprietary?

A: Lately I’ve been using QGIS on a daily basis to analyze TomTom and OSM data and I admit I’m a bit rusty with this. I understand GIS concepts and know what I want, but I simply can’t find the one icon out of the 50 million icons on multiple toolbars that are shown.

Aside from QGIS, most of what we do is programming so lots of JavaScript-ing and PostgreSQL/MySQL.

Q: You are from New Jersey (which is my adopted home state). Why is New Jersey the butt of so many jokes?

A: Well these days, you can probably blame Chris Christie! Also maybe spillover from Filthadelphia? I don’t know, I really love New Jersey (Exit 16E before anyone asks, “what exit??”). You grow up with a certain toughness living there, especially in the densely populated areas, that prepares you for the rest of your life.

Q: You now live in Colorado. What do you miss most about New Jersey?

A: The shore, the cultural diversity, and Bruce Springsteen. I love that NJ has an identity unlike, for example… Delaware! It never leaves you, it defines you, and you make sure everyone knows you are from Jersey.

Q: What do you like most about Colorado? How is the geo scene there? How about the geohipster scene?

A: That’s an easy one – hiking in the Rocky Mountains. The geo scene is quite good, although I haven’t been as good at attending many meetups here. It seems most major companies are opening offices in the Denver area so it’ll be interesting to see what mapping divisions and even potential startups will make it here.

Q: What do you do for fun?

A: It’s difficult to get away from coding and mapping even when I’m not “working” because this is what I enjoy doing. My next side project is to create some artwork using OSM data that I can put up on all my empty walls. No details yet as the idea is still forming in my head!

If I’m not at my computer though, I enjoy hiking, craft beer, oxford commas, and playing modern board games.

Q: Do you consider yourself a (geo)hipster? Why / why not?

A: I love maps and I ride bicycles. Does that qualify me as a geohipster?

Q: On closing, any words of wisdom for our global readership?

A: Take care of each other. Be kind, be courteous, be professional. This was the first community I “joined” on Twitter, not fully understanding the purpose of Twitter or what I was supposed to be doing. But you know, you make some friends along the way, maybe even lifelong friends – all because you had a common interest in maps. So do your part and keep the community going, and someday, it may even lead to an interview with the GeoHipster team 🙂

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*The above interview represents Kumiko’s views. Not those of MapQuest or Verizon.