The Map Room

David Hopp sent me a note about his new website, CLIWOC Repurposed. “The Climatological Database for the World’s Oceans 1750-1850 (CLIWOC) was a project sponsored by the European Union from 2001 through 2003. Meteorological data was extracted from the logbooks of ships, sailing primarily under the flags of Great Britain Spain, The Netherlands, and France. […] The intended purpose of this present web site is to explore visualiztions of the CLIWOC data not for their meteorological value, but to illustrate the trade routes of the ships of the four countries.” Which he does with a set of maps, one for each country, showing that country’s Atlantic trade routes.

We’ve heard about The Atlantic Neptune, an 18th-century multi-volume atlas of the eastern shores of North America produced by J. F. W. des Barres. Jeffrey Murray returns to the pages of Fine Books and Collections magazine (see previous entry) to explore the making of The Atlantic Neptune, including Des Barres’s surveys of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick. Thanks to Rebecca Barry for the tip.

Previously: The Atlantic Neptune; Rare Book Auction Features Copy of Atlantic Neptune; Atlantic Neptune Auctioned for C$900,000; Spacing Atlantic on Mapping Halifax.

The Washington Post reports on a conference held last Friday at the Library of Congress: Re-Examining the Portolan Chart: History, Navigation and Science explored the mysterious origins of the portolan chart, which apparently appeared from nowhere, with no known antecedents, in the 13th century. Via MapHist.

Since 2004, the International Maritime Organization has required all vessels of 300 or more gross tons to carry an AIS transponder, which transponder transmits position, speed and course and other information about the ship. MarineTraffic.com takes that data and plots it on a map. The data is updated every hour — close enough to real-time. Think about it: this is a near-real-time map of every ship on the planet above a certain size. Mind-boggling. Via Cartophilia.

Previously: ESA Maps European Shipping Routes.

It’s one thing if your road map has an error in it, quite another if your aviation or nautical maps have an error in them. It can be catastrophic. Which is why, PC World reports, Garmin is recalling data cards that show incorrect water depths off the coasts of Sweden and Denmark. It’s never a good thing when your charts say that the water is deeper than it actually is.

The European Space Agency has released maps showing European shipping routes, based on seven years’ worth of radar tracking. The ESA also correlates these routes with NO2 emissions; marine engines apparently burn rather dirty fuel. Via La Cartoteca….  •  Continue reading this entry.

About.com’s Amanda Briney has a primer on great circles. A great circle is the shortest distance between two points on a sphere; sailors and aviators use great circles to get the fastest and most efficient route from point A to…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Via GeoCarta comes this curious story about a cruise ship accident that may have been the result of faulty nautical charts of the area, rather than negligence on the part of the ship’s crew. In April 2007 the Sea Diamond…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Another collection of nautical charts for use within Google Earth, this time from Navimatics (KML link). The marine maps cover the coastline of the lower 48, and are derived from NOAA’s Electronic Navigational Charts. Via Ogle Earth and Free…  •  Continue reading this entry.

On the Making Maps: DIY Cartography blog, John Krygier has a post about nautical symbols, both past (circa 1957) and present….  •  Continue reading this entry.

Canadian newspapers are reporting that the collection of Canadiana up for auction this week (see previous entry) went for the equivalent of $1.5 million (Canadian) — the Atlantic Neptune itself selling for the equivalent of around $900,000. (The article…  •  Continue reading this entry.

The rare book collection of the late Frank Streeter goes up for auction next Monday at Christie’s in New York; among the significant early Canadiana highlighted by this Canadian wire-service article about the auction is a copy of the…  •  Continue reading this entry.

The data for NOAA’s nautical charts is free and available for download, but not necessarily usable in your software application. EarthNC has taken more than 600 NOAA charts and converted them into something Google Earth can use. They’re selling…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Czech historians working in the research library in the city of Olomouc stumbled across a copy of a 1563 nautical atlas — only the sixth known to exist — by the Catalan cartographer Jaume Olives, Radio Praha reports. The…  •  Continue reading this entry.

The Analog GPS: “Take your batteries and slavish dependence on other high-tech flummery and heave it overboard. With this device, you can pinpoint your location anywhere on earth and not be reliant on dodgy bits of information being projected…  •  Continue reading this entry.

A copy of the first accurate map of Scotland — a “rutter,” a book of sailing directions — is to be auctioned this week in Edinburgh, BBC News and The Scotsman report. The “Nicolay rutter” is a 1583 copy…  •  Continue reading this entry.

A new book from the University of Chicago Press looks interesting: Cartographies of Travel and Navigation, edited by James R. Akerman, a collection of essays about the history of all kinds of transportation-related maps — railroads, roads, nautical and…  •  Continue reading this entry.

The Atlantic Neptune, “a magnificent four-volume atlas of sea charts and views of the east coast of North America, published during the American Revolutionary War by Joseph Frederick Wallet Des Barres (1722-1824),” has been scanned and put online by…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Zoomatron uses MapCruncher to overlay nautical charts on top of the Virtual Earth interface. Massachusetts and Washington states. The method reminds me of what Skyvector.com did with aeronautical charts. Via Windows Live Local/Virtual Earth. See previous entries: MapCruncher Update; MapCruncher….  •  Continue reading this entry.

NOAA’s nautical charts are available for free download as raster images in BSB format, GPS Tracklog reports. Rich mentions that the files can be used in OziExplorer; NOAA has a list of software and an online viewer….  •  Continue reading this entry.

I can’t believe I haven’t mentioned portolan charts on The Map Room yet. In that vein, don’t miss peacay’s big post on BibliOdyssey about Battista Agnese’s sixteenth-century Portolan Atlas, scans of which are available on several sites….  •  Continue reading this entry.

Sailwx.info’s real-time map of ship locations (based on data from the Voluntary Observing Ships program) has been getting a lot of play on the web lately — I first saw it on La Cartoteca — but the site has a…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Charles Ryan writes, “I am looking for information on copper engraved plates used — many, many years ago — for producing maps and charts, particularly for Naval Hydrographic Office charts. Can you recommend a source for doing some research or…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Some upcoming map and map-related exhibitions to tell you about: Silver Spring, Maryland: From a NOAA press release: “Artifacts representing nearly 200 years of science, service and stewardship by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and its ancestor agencies will…  •  Continue reading this entry.

NOAA’s Office of Coast Survey’s Historical Map and Chart Collection “contains over 20,000 maps and charts from the late 1700s to present day. The Collection includes some of the nation’s earliest nautical charts, hydrographic surveys, topographic surveys, geodetic surveys, city…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Another review of navigation software from the September 2005 issue of Motor Boating magazine (see previous entry)….  •  Continue reading this entry.

Motor Boating’s Electronics department periodically reviews charting and navigation software (see previous entry); this review of three brands is from their June 2005 issue….  •  Continue reading this entry.

Sea Kayaker magazine has an extensive guide to digital navigation — i.e., using a GPS, digitized maps and mapping software — in its February 2005 issue. Via Gadling….  •  Continue reading this entry.

As you know, I like to keep track of what Mac mapping or GPS software is out there. Here’s another one: GPSNavX, which is boating software — both navigation and GPS — for OS X. The folks behind this one…  •  Continue reading this entry.

I don’t think there’s a single area of mapping where software isn’t displacing traditional maps. That goes for navigational charts, too. Motor Boating has a review of recent navigation software for recreational boaters. Some of it’s quite pricey, but let’s…  •  Continue reading this entry.