Big Maps

The Electric Map to Continue on Film
Don’t look now, but the Gettysburg National Military Park’s defunct Electric Map may be making a comeback of sorts: the presentation was recorded before the map was dismantled earlier this year, and the Park plans to show it alongside another film (“A New Birth of Freedom”) and let the public…   Read more →
Posted on Tuesday, October 6, 2009 at 3:48 PM
Categories: Big Maps, Historical Maps
The Globe and Mail on the Challenger Map
An update on the Challenger Map, a portion of which is now being used “to familiarize visitors and security officers from other parts of the country with the intricate, geographical contours of the Olympic security zone,” from the Globe and Mail. There does not appear to be much new since…   Read more →
Posted on Tuesday, October 6, 2009 at 12:15 PM
Categories: Big Maps
Challenger Map Back on Display, Sort Of
The amazing Challenger Map, the giant relief map of British Columbia that was on display at the Pacific National Exhibition until 1997 but has since languished in storage, is back on display, sort of. The Vancouver Sun reports that eight of its 196 sections have been painted, assembled and…   Read more →
Posted on Sunday, June 14, 2009 at 12:28 PM
Categories: Big Maps
More on the Mapparium
Curious Expeditions visits the Mapparium, the three-story walkthrough glass globe that was built in 1935 for the headquarters of the Christian Science Monitor; they also have a Flickr photoset. Via Cartophilia. Previously: The Mapparium….   Read more →
Posted on Wednesday, March 25, 2009 at 8:33 PM
Categories: Big Maps, Globes
Mapping the Inauguration: A Roundup
Last month, the Armed Services Inauguration Committee revealed to the public a 40×40-foot map used to plan the inauguration (via Vector One); another view is here (thumbnail above; via MapHist). New Google Earth imagery for Washington, D.C. finally de-pixellates the U.S. Naval Observatory; censored aerial imagery is being replaced…   Read more →
Posted on Tuesday, January 20, 2009 at 8:19 AM
Categories: Big Maps, Censorship, Security & Privacy, Current Events, Google Earth, Satellite & Aerial
Elections on Ice!
Those of you watching NBC or MSNBC for your dose of election coverage last night may have noticed that they transformed the ice rink at the Rockefeller Center into an election map; apparently they did this the last time, too. Who needs holograms, anyway?…   Read more →
Posted on Wednesday, November 5, 2008 at 8:26 AM
Categories: Big Maps, Electoral Maps
Shanghai in 2020
We’ve seen this scale model of Shanghai before, but Neatorama provides some more information: “On the third floor of the Shanghai Urban Planning Museum, there is what probably is the world’s largest scale model of a city. The room-sized model of central Shanghai in 2020, as envisioned by the…   Read more →
Posted on Friday, August 8, 2008 at 6:13 PM
Categories: Big Maps, Shanghai
Lights Out for the Electric Map
Like many large map installations, the Electric Map of the Battle of Gettysburg has gone the way of the dodo. The 30×30-foot map has been illustrating troop movements during the battle using more than 600 light bulbs since it opened 45 years ago, but there’s no room for it in…   Read more →
Posted on Sunday, May 11, 2008 at 5:14 PM
Categories: Big Maps, Historical Maps
More About Restoring the World’s Fair Map
The New York Times has more about the continuing efforts to restore at least part of the so-called Texaco Map, the terrazo map from the 1964-65 World’s Fair; see also this related blog entry about the return of a missing letter. Via MapHist. Previously: Restoring the Texaco Map….   Read more →
1
Posted on Monday, April 7, 2008 at 9:37 PM
Categories: Big Maps
Another Challenger Map Update
Don Young writes to tell us about the Challenger Map’s new website, which means that my old links are now broken. “This is a renewed site from the Challenger Map Foundation updating the status of the map and the further plans to restore the map to it’s former glory,…   Read more →
Posted on Monday, March 10, 2008 at 8:47 PM
Categories: Big Maps
Challenger Map Update
Melissa writes, “Since you bring it up, here’s an update on the Challenger Map” — which, you will recall, has been in storage since 1997. From yesterday’s Vancouver Sun: Now efforts are about to begin to restore the 196-piece wooden map to its former glory in hopes it can…   Read more →
Posted on Friday, January 4, 2008 at 12:05 PM
Categories: Big Maps
B.C. Living Map Moves
The large, 12×22-metre Living Map, a showpiece of the apparently defunct “B.C. Experience” exhibition in Victoria, British Columbia, is being moved to an agriculturally themed tourist attraction in nearby Saanich. (This map should not be confused with the older and larger Challenger Map; B.C. does seem to specialize in…   Read more →
Posted on Thursday, January 3, 2008 at 2:03 PM
Categories: Big Maps
Challenger Map Gets Reprieve
A highlight of Vancouver’s Pacific National Exhibition grounds was George Challenger’s massive — at 26×24 metres — exaggerated-relief map of British Columbia, which was on display at the B.C. Pavillion until that building was torn down in 1997. Saved from destruction, the map has since been in storage until…   Read more →
Posted on Thursday, November 8, 2007 at 5:39 AM
Categories: Big Maps
Giant Lego Map of the U.S.
Boing Boing reports that, at the World Children’s Festival in Washington, DC this past weekend, Lego set up a “building event” in which kids contributed to a giant Lego mosaic map of the United States. (Thumbnail at right; see Boing Boing for larger photos.)…   Read more →
Posted on Tuesday, June 26, 2007 at 8:09 AM
Categories: Big Maps
The Living Map
Cartography draws our attention to the Living Map, a huge, three-dimensional map of British Columbia now on display as part of the “B.C. Experience” exhibition that just opened in Victoria’s Crystal Garden. The 40-foot-by-74-foot map even models the curvature of the earth. More on the Living Map on the…   Read more →
Posted on Sunday, July 2, 2006 at 6:06 PM
Categories: Big Maps

Note: Entries from 2003 were not categorized and will not appear in the category archives. Please consult the monthly archives.