Our Team

Aoife Dowling graduated with an honours degree in Geography and also holds a Higher Diploma in Geographical Information Systems and Remote Sensing from NUI Maynooth. Since graduation Aoife was employed as a GIS technician within the Local Authority sector in Ireland and was appointed as a Data Analyst with the All-Island Research Observatory (AIRO) project in early 2010.

Aoife is an expert in the design and development of AIRO Instant Atlas web mapping census toolkits and acts as the primary contact point for all AIRO public sector clients. Aoife is responsible for the delivery of our 'Data for Decisions' workshops, the development of the AIRO Data Store and is also our main contact point for both INSPIRE and the ISDE.

Aoife's main research areas are in the development of interactive mapping and visualisation systems to aid the improvement of evidence informed planning in Ireland. A key aspect of Aoife's current work is focused on the development of a new AIRO DataStore containing a national set of open data. Aoife has expert knowledge in a series of key data and mapping software's: Instant Atlas, ESRI ArcGIS, ArcGIS Viewer for Flex, ArcGIS for Server, QGIS, Mapinfo, Tableau and FME. 

Ainhoa González graduated with a first class honours degree in Agricultural Engineering from Pamplona University in 1997, a first class honours Masters in Environmental Resource Management from University College Dublin in 2001, and a PhD in Environmental Planning from Dublin Institute of Technology in 2008. She has complemented her studies with a Diploma in Environmental Impact Assessment Management from University College Dublin in 2000, and a Higher Diploma in Environmental Engineering from Trinity College Dublin in 2004. In 2009 she took a research officer position at Trinity College Dublin, and led a work package on a European FP-7 funded project BRIDGE that developed a pragmatic GIS-based decision-support system for assessing the sustainability of urban planning alternatives. In 2012 she became a part-time teaching assistant at Trinity College Dublin, where she coordinates a number of MSc course modules, and a part-time researcher at NIRSA where she has contributed to European and national research projects. She is a board member of the International Association for Impact Assessment’s UK-Ireland branch, and the regional delegate of the Spanish Association for Impact Assessment. She is also a member of the international editorial review board of the Journal of Environmental Assessment Policy and Management (JEAPM) and the International Journal of Information Systems and Social Change (IJISSC).

Ainhoa’s research focuses on the contribution of spatial data and GIS to environmental planning and sustainable development. This includes the development of pragmatic methodologies in support of sustainable development, and geographically-explicit indicators to assist assessment and monitoring processes associated with land-use planning and decision-making. The focal point of her research has been physical geography and, in particular, spatial examination of environmental aspects. However, environmental policy implementation and public participation are of significant interest to her. Her research has always strived to bring science and practice together through the development of practical methods and research findings that can be used and applied by practitioners.

Gavin McArdle is developing the Dublin Dashboard with AIRO.  The dashboard will provide citizens, government workers and companies with real-time information, urban indicator and benchmarking data, and other forms of data about all aspects of the city – transport, environment, economy, housing, culture, population, health, etc. – through a series of web-based interactive graphs, maps and apps. The dashboard will complement the existing work of AIRO in these areas.  Gavin’s background is in computer science with both a BSc and PhD from UCD. Gavin has worked on a variety of research projects, including map personalisation, geo-visual analysis, human mobility analysis and Human Computer Interaction for spatial interfaces. Through his research Gavin has gained expertise in spatial data analysis techniques and has developed many useful applications and tools for the domain.

Gavin is currently a researcher in the National Centre for Geocomputation at NUI Maynooth on the European Research Council (ERC) funded project, The Programmable City, where he is interested in understanding how dashboards and indicators are developed and used. Gavin is also a Science Foundation Ireland funded Industry Fellow at the IBM Smarter Cities Research lab in Dublin where he is involved in cutting-edge projects in the intelligent transport domain.