History of the Affiliated Regional Weather NetworksThe first Regional network (
Southwestern aka "SWN") was founded by Chris Arndt
San Luis Obispo, CA with Matt Pace
Gold Canyon, AZ and Ken
Capitola, CA in March, 2006, and by the end of that month, there were 7 stations in the network, including
Las Vegas, NV,
Tahoe Vista, CA,
El Dorado Hills, CA, and
Saratoga, CA.
The SWN started as a private forum where weather enthusiast members could meet and discuss topics of mutual interest. One of the topics of discussion what how to increase visibility of the member's personal weather websites in search engine rankings. The idea was to create a mesomap display with links to member websites would be a useful addition to our respective websites, and due to the member sites posting links to the other member sites, the search engine rankings would be improved. In late March, 2006, Matt started generating the first mesomap graphic and hand-made CSS/HTML to display rotating conditions on the graphic. Ken True (
Saratoga, CA) created PHP scripts to automate the generation of the manual CSS/HTML. As more members joined the SWN, the original mesomap became sluggish as it would need to fetch conditions from each member site before displaying the mesomap. To fix the issue, a two-part function with a data collector running via cron on the network hub site, and a mesomap that would use/cache the collected data to dynamically generate the mesomap with rotating conditions for member sites was developed.
This system became the primary method to collect data/display mesomap on the Affiliated Regional Weather Network websites.
In May, 2008 Jack Ahern (
Stillweather.com) asked if the mesomap could be offered for the NorthEast and have a regional network set up there. The SWN members agreed, and so the Affiliated Regional Weather Network concept was born, and implementations began. From the 45 stations in the Southwestern Weather Network in May, 2008, the number has grown to
1002 stations in affiliated networks worldwide as of Fri, 03-Sep-2010 20:03:09 EDT
Here is the current chronological list of the networks:
- Southwestern Weather Network was founded in March, 2006 by Chris Arndt San Luis Obispo, CA
with Matt Pace Gold Canyon, AZ, Ken Capitola, CA and Ken True Saratoga, CA. - Northeastern Weather Network was founded in May of 2008 by Jack Ahern of Stillweather.com, Branford, Connecticut.
- North American Weather Network was founded in May of 2008 by Jack Ahern of Stillweather.com, Branford, Connecticut.
- Mid-Atlantic Weather Network was founded in May of 2008 by John Harkness of Horsham Weather.
In July, 2009, Ken True began hosting and administration for the MAWN as John had to leave for personal reasons. - Midsouth Weather Network was founded in May of 2008 by Mike Berry of SoHiWeather.
- Northwest Weather Network was founded in May of 2008 by Mike Challis of Long Beach, WA Weather.
In Oct, 2008, Ken True began hosting and administration for the NWWN as Mike had to leave for personal reasons. - Southeastern Weather Network was founded in May of 2008 by Chris of CapeWeather.com.
- Nordic Weather Network was founded in May of 2008 by Henkka of www.nordicweather.net.
- Plains Weather Network was founded in May of 2008 by Drew of OPWeather.com.
- Rocky Mountain Weather Network was founded in May, 2008 by Tony of ThorntonWeather.com
- Scottish Weather Network was founded in May, 2008 by Martin Collins of Hebrides Weather, Eye Peninsula (Point), Isle of Lewis, Scotland.
- Midwestern Weather Network was founded in June of 2008 by Tim Hanko of www.thanko.info.
- New Zealand Weather Network was founded in June of 2008 by Grant of www.nzweather.net.
- Australian Weather Network was founded in June of 2008 by Henk of Lyndhurst-Hill Weather in Queensland, Australia.
- Alaskan Weather Network was founded in June of 2008 by Tim Hanko of www.thanko.info
- United Kingdom Weather Network was founded in June of 2008 by Grant of www.metserv.info.
- Irish Weather Network was founded in August of 2008 by Karl of Dublin Weather in Dublin, Ireland.
- Namibia Weather Network was founded in October of 2008 by Jens of Windhoek Weather in Windhoek, Namibia.
- Canadian Atlantic Weather Network was founded in February of 2009 by Jim of HRMweather.com in Cole Harbour, Nova Scotia.
- Italian Weather Network was founded in February of 2009 by Alessandro of Carmignano Weather in Carmignano (Po), Tuscany, Italy.
- Quebec Weather Network was founded in April of 2009 by Michel Hébert of Météo Lanaudière, Saint-Alphonse-Rodriguez, Québec, Canada.
- Bulgarian Weather Network was founded in July of 2009 by Radmil Pandev of Stamboliski Weather in Stamboliski, Bulgaria.
- Hellas Meteo Network was founded in February of 2010 by Alexandros Stefanopoulos of Meteoarachova in Arachova, Greece.
- Hungarian Weather Network was founded in March of 2010 by Baranyi Attila of Meteo Kartal in Kartal, Hungary.
- Ontario Weather Network was founded in July of 2010 by Ann-Marie Keenan of Beamsville Weather Station in Lincoln, Ontario, Canada.
- Argentina Weather Network was founded in July of 2010 by Diego Sala of Estación Meteorológica in Quilmes, Buenos Aires, Argentina.
- Poland Weather Network was founded in July of 2010 by Andrzej Czenczek of ASM Andretti - Zabrze Helenka in Zabrze, Poland.
- Benelux Weather Network was founded in July of 2010 by Peter Groeneveld of Meteo Leudal Limburg in Midden-Limburg, Netherlands.
- Serbian Weather Network was founded in August 2010 by Radmil Pandev of Bulgarian Weather Network - BGWN in Stamboliski, Bulgaria.
- French Weather Network was founded in August of 2010 by Dick Wismeijer of Bergerie Meteo, Montauroux, Var-Provence, France.
- Western Canada Weather Network was founded in September of 2010 by Blaine Carmichael of Calgary Weather Station in Calgary, Alberta, Canada.
Henkka of
Nordic Weather Network has taken the original mesomap and developed an impressive collection system using PHP/SQL and display on a Google Map for the largest single network in the Affiliated Networks (217 stations). That system was also implemented by Karl of the
Irish Weather Network for his network.
I express my personal thanks to the Regional Network Administrators for their enthusiasm, hosting and maintenance of their respective regional networks -- this grass-roots effort has been very rewarding and a great deal of fun, and who knew that a simple concept started in 2006 with 7 stations would grow to over 1000 stations and 29 affiliated networks worldwide.
If you have an interest in starting a Regional Weather Network for an area not currently covered, please
contact Ken True.
As an aside, the current census of the stations shows Weather-Display as the most common weather software with 622 of the 1002 stations
Best regards,
Ken
Edit: 17-Sep-2010 - added Western Canada Weather Network
