This one slipped past me: the eighth edition of Map Use: Reading Analysis, Interpretation, the college textbook by A. Jon Kimerling, Aileen R. Buckley, Phillip C. Muehrcke and Juliana O. Muehrcke, came out last November from Esri Press. [GIS Lounge]
Where Disaster Strikes
Where Disaster Strikes: Modern Space and the Visualization of Destruction, an exhibition of disaster maps, is taking place now until 19 April at Harvard’s Pusey Library.
Floods, fires, earthquakes, volcanoes, bombings, droughts, and even alien invasions: disaster can take many forms. And, although disasters are always felt dramatically, a disaster’s form and location impacts who records its effects and what forms those records take. “Where Disaster Strikes” investigates the intertwined categories of modern space and disaster through the Harvard Map Collection’s maps of large destructive events from the London Fire to the present.
Open to the public. The exhibition also has a substantial online presence.
Engraved in Copper
Engraved in Copper: The Art of Mapping Minnesota opened this week at the University of Minnesota’s Elmer L. Andersen Library. “This exhibit highlights unique engraved copper plates used to print topographic maps of Minnesota in the early 1900s, surveying and mapmaking techniques, and government documents related to the process. The plates are part of the evolution of government mapping and the history of the United States Geological Survey, from early mapping efforts to Geographic Information Systems.” Runs until 22 May.
Milwaukee’s Map Store Closing
The Map Store, a Milwaukee institution that has been in business since 1937, will be going out of business on April 1st. The Map Store’s owner cited “the combination of falling revenue and his age” (he’s 78) as reasons to close shop. [Cartophilia]
Always sad to see a map store close, but these are not unfamiliar reasons: the age and ill health of the proprietor felled Alaska’s Observatory Books; and Seattle’s Wide World Books and Maps fell victim to online shopping.
Marie Tharp Video
Marie Tharp, who died in 2006, has never been more in the public eye. This short film for the Royal Institution, animated by Rosanna Wan and narrated by Helen Czerski, is the fourth profile I’ve seen of her within the past year. [National Geographic]
Ottawa and Gatineau’s Growing Suburbs
Meanwhile, the Ottawa-Gatineau urban agglomeration (which is, as urban areas go, the closest to where I currently live) has, according to the census, grown by 5.5 percent since 2011, to a total population of 1.3 million. Much of that growth has occurred in suburbs that barely existed even when I moved to the region in 1999. This CBC Ottawa feature uses the Google Earth engine’s timelapse video function to chart the growth of seven of those suburbs. (Above: the Gatineau suburb of Aylmer.)
Mapping Canadian Census Data
Statistics Canada released population and dwelling data from the 2016 Census yesterday. MountainMath’s CensusMapper project already has interactive maps based on that data: population change since 2011 (absolute and percentage), population density, and unoccupied dwellings—with presumably more to come, since the interface allows you to make your own census-derived maps.
An Error-Ridden Tube Map Shower Curtain
Speaking of Londonist, they had a great deal of fun pedantically savaging a decidedly unofficial tube map shower curtain. “This error-ridden shower curtain was purchased via a random seller on ebay, whom we’re not going to gratify with a link. A bit of googling reveals that tube shower curtains are a bit of a thing. There are many variations out there, all presumably knocked together and marketed without permission from Transport for London.” (So much of a thing that I thought I’d linked to something like this before, but apparently not. No doubt my readers can send me links.)
Previously: Map Shower Curtain and Bikini; More Map Shower Curtains; Sea Monster Shower Curtain.
New Edition of London: A Life in Maps
This post on Londonist obliquely lets us know that there’s a new edition of Peter Whitfield’s
Related: Map Books of 2017.
Matthew Rangel
In Matthew Rangel’s art, landscape and map literally blur together. Rangel draws on his travels and combines mountain ranges, text, drawings and other imagery with cartography, sometimes drawn on old maps themselves. More at Socks. [Kottke]
Previously: Journeys Beyond the Neatline.
The Last Unmapped Places
Lois Parshley’s essay on the last unmapped, mysterious places—Greenlandic fjords, the slums of Haiti, the ocean’s depths, black holes in space—is a long read worth reading. Originally published last month as “Here Be Dragons: Finding the Blank Spaces in a Well-Mapped World” in the Virginia Quarterly Review, it’s been reprinted by the Guardian, in an edited, tighter version, as “Faultlines, Black Holes and Glaciers: Mapping Uncharted Territories.”
Fantasy Maps Exhibit at Texas A&M Library
An exhibition of fantasy maps, Worlds Imagined: The Maps of Imaginary Places Collection, opens Friday at Texas A&M University’s Cushing Memorial Library and Archives. “The maps included are part of an ongoing effort by [Texas A&M’s] Maps and GIS [Library] and the Science Fiction & Fantasy Research Collection to develop a shared collection of maps of imaginary places. Cushing is known worldwide for its collection of science fiction and fantasy materials, even housing [George R. R.] Martin’s personal collection of memorabilia.” Worlds Imagined runs until 10 October 2017. [Thanks, Alex.]
Previously: Fantasy Maps Exhibit at St. Louis Central Library.
Mapping Where America Depends on Trade
The Washington Post maps the parts of the United States most dependent on trade—and thus most at risk if the Trump administration starts a trade war with the U.S.’s trading partners.
Google Maps for Android Adds Information Tabs
Yesterday’s update to Google Maps for Android includes tabs for nearby points of interest, driving information and traffic conditions, and transit schedules and recommendations. More at The Verge.
Previously: Google Roundup for January 2017.
50 Fantasy States
50 Fantasy States is Chris Engelsma’s ongoing project to create fantasy-style maps of all 50 U.S. states. Six have been completed so far, including the above fantasy map of Alaska.