But I can’t quite believe the venom directed here at the OS 1:50k. Single best cartography in the world, bar none. And if OS 1:25k is so great how come that it (in Explorer form) isn’t offered via OpenSpace?

No mention of the Harveys 1:40k maps. The (relatively) new people on the scene. The Harvey BMC mountain maps are great! They fit the balance nicely between enough outdoor detail, but also the scale is large enough not to have reams of paper flapping around.

What is needed is more “free” online OS or Harvey’s mapping apps. Mimicking the currently expensive mapping software from anquet and memory map. These work well and are very popular so why wouldn’t properly created online apps.

There is a trend towards mapping your sports activities and OS are missing this boat and letting others take the lead especially google maps)

There is nothing wrong with the OS 50k per se, the problem is nothing has been done to innovate its cartography for the last 20(?) years. Which brings us back to the need for some fearless modernising cartographers…

If it was automatically rendered it could be commercially viable. Now I wonder if anyone thought of doing that at the OS…

Tim

I agree OS 1:25K maps are great for walkers and can work well online is displayed carefully, but Steven does also have a good point about 1:50K mapping. We both know from our time at the OS, is only exists because people are too afraid to kill it, it’s really not useful for very much any more (1:25k has in effect replaced it), and cannot be commercial viable.

ed

I’ve got to stick up for OS mapping here!

OK it does not look great at the wrong scale in web mapping apps - but it is still the UK’s favourite mapping (Multimap certainly got a lot of complaints when there was a brief period without OS mapping on the site). Remember a lot of people still use web mapping sites to go and print a map of an area of interest and look to OS mapping as a familiar cartography.

Go for a hike somewhere else in Europe and you will soon be missing your excuisite manual cartography on OS 1:25k.

Tim

Just imagine the response if Google took the moderately well rendered stack of TeleAtlas maps out of GM and replaced them with a stack that contained OS 1:250k mini scale, 1:50k Raster (very possibly the ugliest map ever), StreetView and 1:10k Raster. People would respond with a yuck!!! The attractive maps are one of the reasons that people preferred GM to MultiMap or Streetmap.co.uk

Have a look at the styling of the maps in OSM and you will see what can be achieved with good styling.

Cartographers need to focus their skills on the way information is presented on the web rather than bemoaning the decline of paper maps.

Steven

Computer-generated map-making technology emerged in the 1985-1995 period following developments from 1965-1985. When government agencies switched from map scribing and plate-making for printing to the use of computer-generated graphical representations, it marked the end of the old cartographic paradigm. It also marked the beginning of the current situation when new mapping developments expanded into many new markets outside government.

Traditional cartographers generally switched to a GIS focus or, in some cases, retired. The fundamentals of cartography transitioned to digital mapping and GIS software, so that many of the principles of cartography were applied using algorithms rather than by the acquired skills of the cartographer.

The reality today is that GIS greatly lowered the cost of making maps and created many new geographic visualization opportunities. Map making functions moved into the mainstream of information-based technology and away from older printing technologies. In making the transition, the knowledge and skills of data manipulation, data analysis and geo-visualization pushed the mapping knowledge domain into the IT and management domains. Knowledge of how to organize complex geospatial data and communicate its meaning still requires advanced geographic knowledge of geospatial organization and graphic representation. Many online mash-ups are basically push-pin maps created using little geographic knowledge, but provide great value to many users.

By ignoring trends outside their field, cartographers slow-to-change attitudes led to their own decline. Other examples show that elevator operators were replaced by a panel of buttons and complex map printing technologies have been replace by the print button on a graphic browser interface. The world has moved on for the better, I believe.

Ed says “the final media used to communicate is rarely paper…” Interesting, as when I head to office printer there are often a few printed maps and directions waiting to be collected. The recycling bin has a collection of discarded directions. I’m sure if an objective is to direct someone from the office to the sandwich shop you draw them a map with 4 lines and a circle. Of course there is a geeky way of sending them directions to their phone. But having witnessed 2 suited and booted techno geeks back in 1999 spending 10 mins trying to swap “e-business cards” via infrared on their phones – paper and pen sometimes rule.

Finally, I have watched non-geo people looking at online maps (in a non-sinister way). It never ceases to amaze me how excited the unenlightened get when looking at aerial photography “It even shows Fred’s extension up at number 32…” – not much in the way of cartographic skills required to set-up that layer.

Just because it is easy to make maps online does not mean that it is easy to make good maps online. Anyone can use a word processor to write, yet much of what is written is useless to most people.

Much about online mapping is problematic, not only to cartographers but to many disciplines. So called mashups can combine data that is, yes, geographically overlapping. Yet the data is often from sources of different accuracies, time, and scale. Data sources vary in reliability also. So what results from the mashups? Without proper oversight and discipline, mashups are often meaningless or worse, misleading.

I’m all for the explosion of maps and wider uses of geographic information, online and off. But to cast aside cartography, a discipline that was, in part, responsible for us getting here in the first place, and is still actively improving geographic visualization, is simply wrong.

At least with an online/electronic map the potential is there to add detail at different zooms or on demand. I would have thought that a cartographic group would be getting excited about these possibilities.

In the worst case scenario, bad data can be presented badly and lead to bad decisions being made. Does it ever get updated, and if so when? Publishing the foot and mouth protection zone on Google maps is great but did the Google map get updated as the zones changed on a daily basis?

Of course, there’s no guarantee that official or expert bodies will get it right. The plans to publish UK crime data are a good example of this. (see BBC website article)

Online maps and “mash-ups” are great but you can’t just throw a load of data on a map and expect it to work.

http://googleearthdesign.blogspot.com/2008/09/gis.html

Today’s medium has changed - but the need to present information spatially has not. Perhaps this is the challenge cartographers face: embrace today’s technologies for presenting information spatially. Its always been more than maps!