This is a response to the JSON document fast lookup with MySQL 5.7 article by Frederic Descamp.

It is very easy to also use MySQL Workbench and the new GeoJSON support to actually show the features.

My query:
SELECT ST_GeomFromGeoJSON(feature->"$.geometry",2) AS feature 
FROM test_features WHERE street='BEACH' ;

The result:
 

In my business (weather) we use lots map based (Geo) information.  Almost every table has latitude and longitude. Working with this kind of data can be exciting and frustrating.  This should give you a quick start into GIS with MySQL.

“A geographic information system (GIS), or geographical information system, is any system that captures, stores, analyzes, manages, and presents data that are linked to location. In the simplest terms, GIS is the merging of cartography, statistical analysis, and database technology. GIS systems are used in cartography, remote sensing, land surveying, …

1. Scientists Without Borders -- "Mobilizing Science, Improving Lives". mobilize and coordinate science-based activities that improve quality of life in the developing world. The research community, aid agencies, NGOs, public-private partnerships, and a wide variety of other institutions are already promoting areas such as global health, agricultural progress, and environmental well-being, but current communication gaps restrict their power. Organizations and individuals do not always know about one another's endeavors, needs, or availability, which limits the ability to forge meaningful connections and harness resources. This situation is especially striking in light of the growing realization that integrated rather than focused approaches are crucial for addressing key challenges such as extreme poverty and the glaring health …

When we think about how government uses geographic information, we tend to think about USGS maps or census data, very centralized and preplanned projects meant to produce a very specific set of products. But Development Seed believes that there is a lot more that could be done if these types of data could be mashed up easily with each other as well as with alternate sources such as social networks. Eric Gunderson, President of Development Seed, will be speaking at the O'Reilly Where 2.0 Conference in June, and he recently took some time to speak to us about the potential benefits that open access to government data brings.

James Turner: Can you start by talking a bit about Development Seed and how you came to be involved with it?

EG: We're a strategy organization in Washington, D.C., and what …

The amount of data out there via API's is increadible these days. For instance you can take an address, and get the latitude and longitude using Google's GeoCoding API.

I am using this API along with some others to build a pretty some interesting stuff (more on that when its public).

Today I needed to calculate the distance between two points, I found a bunch of formulas here to convert two lats and longs into miles. They had some more complicated formulas, but I went with an easier one because approximate accuracy was sufficent. Here's how the formula translated into SQL (tested on MySQL):

SELECT id, place_name,
ROUND( SQRT( POW((69.1 * (#Val(arguments.latitude)# - latitude)), 2) + POW((53 * (#Val(arguments.longitude)# - …