Totally Tubular

Even if you've never been to London, you've probably seen a map of the Underground, or at least a public transportation system map that was inspired by the original, made in 1931 by Harry Beck.

 

This diagrammatic map pretty much ignores geography in the interests of making the other information present that much easier to decipher. It is given a very clean and easy-to-read look by eschewing the messiness of reality and only using lines that are horizontal, vertical, or at a forty-five degree angle.

However, since it does ignore geography to highlight the Tube's lines, it is fairly easy to be mislead into getting a distorted sense of the city itself while using only this map. For instance, looking at this map, it's not really possible to tell whether the stations are geographically very close to one another. One who doesn't realize that might spend half an hour in the tunnels when the trip above ground would have taken only five minutes, or vice versa. Over the years, some have felt that this was a failing, while others maintained that it didn't matter, as the map's sole purpose was to help one get around in the subway system.

Those who felt that geography oughtn't be ignored have tweaked and prodded at the map over the years. One such re-imagining of the Tube map can be found here. It's still easy to read, and it takes geography into account to give a much more realistic view of the system. Here's a zoomed in screenshot:

Check out their blog for news, links, and a chance to provide feedback.

If you're interested in the evolution of the maps of the London Tube, this site has a nice collection of maps throughout the years.

And here is a very interesting conversation from Edward Tufte's forum about London Tube maps, as well as maps for other transportation systems around the world, that spans nearly a decade. (Unfortunately, some of the older links don't work.)

The United States of Pig

W.E. Baker was a pure-food proponent who lived in Massachusetts. He believed that unsanitary conditions in food production led to disease-- therefore, he opened his very own Sanitary Piggery to show the rest of the world how swine ought to be raised. In July of 1875, he threw a grand party both to celebrate and raise awareness for his new Sanitary Piggery and to commemorate a battle that had been fought nearby.

You can't have a fancy party without fancy party favors (at least, not if you're doing it right), so Baker distributed these maps as ‘good cheer souvenirs’ to his guests, who numbered in the thousands:

 


The map’s full title is: THIS PORCINEOGRAPH is copied from the Census Surveys of 1870, adding only 3 feet of territory (?) resting on Cuba, Mexico and Sandwich Islands, and the Hydro-Cephalus from Canada. Congressional Legislation is required to PERFECT this GEHOGRAPHY.

It seems as though Baker might have been in a rush to get these piggy maps ready for his guests, because there are a few typos, some reversed text, and what seem to be notes to improve future drafts of the map.

Around the map are pigs representing each state, next to a banner with a pork recipe for each state. Michigan's is "Superior White Fish and Larded Sweetbreads."
(It's impossible to read while it's this size but this page has a wonderful detailed version of the map that you can zoom in on.)

Read more about the map here.

Side note: We have an actual print of the Porcineograph at U of M's very own Clements Library!

Where are people moving?

Forbes.com has created this interactive map using IRS data to show where people were moving in 2008. You can click on a county to see its data-- where people moved from (with black lines) and where former residents moved to (red lines). For Washtenaw county, the results looked like this:

How about your county?

NASA Tera Satellite

With the Mississippi overflowing action had to be taken causing the U.S Army Corp to open up gates to flood the Morganza Floodway. Thanks to NASA we can see the amount of water that has spread as a result of this. For more information on the Morganza Floodway or to view a larger image, go here.

Pictographic Maps

Personally, my favorite maps are Pictographs. Often times they are incredibly colorful, detailed in a way most maps are not, and feel to me more telling of an area depicted than just road names.

A wonderful example of this would be this French map of the Mediterranean Sea from the book Decouvrons le monde, or Discover the World.

Many pictorial maps are created for younger audiences, but that doesn't take away from their usefulness for adults! To view this page larger, or to view more pages from this book you can go here.

To view more Mediterranean maps you can visit the University of Michigan map library in person to see our impressive collection from all eras.

Water water everywhere, but will there be any to drink in 2030?

Maps can be, and often are, built to show more than just location. This data map created by Hal Watts shows the amount of water usage through out the world predicted for the year 2030.

He cut out each country from flat sponges and then poured the predicted water needs scaled down onto each and then photographed them in raking light. It gives an interesting point of view of an important topic. To view more of his work go here.

Yellowstone Plume: Bigger than originally thought

Geologists have been using seismic waves from earthquakes to map the area below a hotspot in Yellowstone that was already known to be large.


The latest data, which was gathered via electrical conductivity, proves that this hotspot is even bigger than first imagined. For more detail check out the article on BBC News.