Surveying

The Ordnance Survey in 1953
An excerpt from a newsreel about the latest technology used by Ordnance Survey mapmakers — in 1953. “It used to take two men a whole year to do the mapmaking mathematics that these adding machines and electronic computers can… »
Posted on Saturday, August 2, 2008 at 8:24 PM
Categories: Surveying, Video
Working Cartographers
From the Times’s career section, an article featuring two people working in the cartography field: Jon Ford, a survey geologist with the British Geological Survey, and Edward Mainwaring, a cartographer with the Ordnance Survey…. »
Posted on Thursday, June 26, 2008 at 5:53 AM
Categories: Earth Sciences, Industry News, Surveying
Cadastral GIS Horror Stories
On the Surveying, Mapping and GIS blog, Dave Smith recounts some GIS horror stories involving cadastral data errors — and the ludicrous things that are done to resolve them. “If you have discrepancies, data gaps, quality issues, other issues, I… »
Posted on Thursday, February 14, 2008 at 9:12 PM
Categories: GIS, Surveying
Ed the Map Maker
This is an article celebrating 40 years of service by Ed Maslonka, the cartographer of Grand Island, Nebraska, but it also offers a taste of what goes on, mapping-wise, in municipal planning departments…. »
Posted on Thursday, February 14, 2008 at 9:08 PM
Categories: GIS, Surveying
Boston-Area Map Exhibitions
At the Boston Public Library’s Copley Square through June, Boston and Beyond, a collection of bird’s-eye-view maps of Boston and New England from the second half of the 19th century. At Harvard University’s Pusey Library until April 1, Henry F…. »
Posted on Saturday, January 26, 2008 at 4:14 PM
Categories: Antique Maps, Boston, Earth Sciences, Exhibitions, Globes, Surveying
The Discovery of France
Last week, the National Post website ran a three-part excerpt of Graham Robb’s new book, The Discovery of France: A Historical Geography from the Revolution to the First World War. Of interest to us is the second part, an amusing… »
Posted on Friday, January 4, 2008 at 12:12 PM
Categories: Books, Surveying
A News Roundup and a Programming Note
A few links to news stories to tide you over during the holidays: The Montreal Gazette on OpenStreetMap The Chicago Tribune on map collecting The Times rambles about the technology behind in-car navigation devices I’ll be off for about a… »
Posted on Saturday, December 22, 2007 at 9:25 PM
Categories: Collecting, Driving Directions, Site News, Surveying
The National Map Corps
The United States Geological Survey’s National Map makes use of a corps of volunteers, who are assigned a given area (a USGS quad) and report the names and coordinates of various map features, such as schools, town halls and other… »
Posted on Sunday, October 28, 2007 at 5:45 PM
Categories: Surveying, Topo Maps & Trails, Tracerouting
Vermont’s Ancient Roads
Roger Hart did a better job of covering the issue of Vermont’s ancient and abandoned roads on GeoCarta — which is to say that he covered them and I didn’t: see here and here. In a nutshell, there are apparently… »
Posted on Friday, July 20, 2007 at 1:25 PM
Categories: Antique Maps, Surveying
Miami Herald NAVTEQ Profile
It’s been a while since I’ve seen a newspaper article profiling one or the other mapping data company — i.e., NAVTEQ and/or Tele Atlas — with a focus on its local surveying efforts, but here’s a new one from the… »
Posted on Tuesday, June 26, 2007 at 5:16 PM
Categories: Online Maps, Surveying
Housing Development Built in Wrong Place, Map Blamed
What difference does three metres make? Plenty, according to a story from the Edinburgh Evening News: a mistake in the location of old flats on an Ordnance Survey map is being blamed for a new housing development being built in… »
Posted on Tuesday, March 6, 2007 at 8:39 PM
Categories: Mapping Errors, Surveying
Portland LIDAR Survey
A $1-million project to map the terrain of Portland, Oregon will take place over the next few weeks, the Oregonian reports. The aerial LIDAR survey is intended to create a hyper-accurate terrain map that will be particularly useful in… »
Posted on Monday, February 19, 2007 at 12:34 PM
Categories: Earth Sciences, Portland, Satellite & Aerial, Surveying
Moses Greenleaf Biography
Retired University of Maine professor Walter Macdougall has written a biography of early Maine surveyor and mapmaker Moses Greenleaf, the Bangor Daily News reports. Macdougall’s book, Settling the Maine Wilderness: Moses Greenleaf, His Maps, and His Household of Faith, 1777-1834,… »
Posted on Tuesday, October 24, 2006 at 6:35 PM
Categories: Books, Surveying
The Bowman Expeditions
Kansas University geography professors Jerome Dobson and Peter Herlihy are trying to put geography back on the map (so to speak) after a long, post-WWII decline by proposing series of expeditions — the Bowman Expeditions — that would collect… »
Posted on Monday, October 23, 2006 at 3:27 PM
Categories: Surveying
Getting Out from Behind the Wheel
If you’ve been following this blog’s entries about how digital mapping data providers compile their data (see the Surveying category archives), you’ll know that since time immemorial — or at least the 1940s — mapmakers have compiled their road data… »
Posted on Friday, September 29, 2006 at 10:16 AM
Categories: Surveying
AZ Republic: ‘Mapmaker’s Work Outdated by Time It’s Printed’
Another story about growth outpacing mapmaking, as the Arizona Republic looks at the Phoenix Metropolitan Street Atlas, published by local map store Wide World of Maps, and its cartographer, Bob Cournoyer, who has to deal with an average of 4,000… »
Posted on Friday, July 28, 2006 at 8:21 AM
Categories: Roads, Surveying
Thomas Guides, Navteq on KPCC
On Friday the 7th, there was an item on mapping on Patt Morrison’s afternoon show on 89.3 KPCC, a public radio station based in Pasadena, California. On deck were representatives from Thomas Brothers Maps and Navteq; much of the focus… »
Posted on Tuesday, July 18, 2006 at 12:24 AM
Categories: Mapping Errors, Podcasts & Audio, Publishers, Roads, Surveying
NY Times: Navteq in New York
The New York Times adds to the pile of coverage about digital mapping data providers with this piece about Navteq’s field surveyors, tagging along as they survey a part of Queens. Since Navteq and TeleAtlas don’t sell directly to consumers,… »
Posted on Saturday, July 8, 2006 at 8:15 AM
Categories: Driving Directions, Surveying
Caught Mapping (1940)
Caught Mapping is a nine-minute film, made in 1940, about how the road maps of the time were made — and, more importantly, revised, with a fair bit on field surveyors. I was surprised that the film reported that… »
Posted on Tuesday, July 4, 2006 at 10:50 PM
Categories: Roads, Surveying, Video
China Surveying Hoh Xil Region
China’s official Xinhua news agency reports that the Chinese government has begun mapping a large uninhabited region of western China, variously called Hoh Xil or Kekexili, in the northwestern part of the Tibetan plateau, as part of a project to… »
Posted on Tuesday, May 30, 2006 at 3:27 PM
Categories: Surveying, Topo Maps & Trails
Trigonometrical Survey of England and Wales
BibliOdyssey points to, and posts excerpts from, On the Trig, a virtual exhibition from the British Library on the history of the Trigonometrical Survey of England and Wales — latterly known as the Ordnance Survey…. »
Posted on Thursday, May 25, 2006 at 2:50 PM
Categories: Surveying
Again: TeleAtlas in Berlin
Der Spiegel: TeleAtlas, Berlin. Previously: Navteq, San Diego; Navteq, New York; TeleAtlas, Santa Fe…. »
Posted on Friday, May 12, 2006 at 5:46 PM
Categories: Surveying
OpenStreetMap: Manchester’s Next
Having mapped approximately 90 per cent of the roads on the Isle of Wight last weekend (see previous entry), the OpenStreetMap project now turns to Manchester for its next workshop this coming weekend. Via Boing Boing. See previous entries:… »
Posted on Thursday, May 11, 2006 at 10:20 AM
Categories: Copyright, Surveying, Tracerouting
OpenStreetMap to Map Isle of Wight
Via Boing Boing, news that the OpenStreetMap project will attempt to map the entire Isle of Wight this coming weekend. OpenStreetMap’s goal is to produce freely available, copyright-free mapping data for Britain. Unlike the U.S., where government information is public… »
Posted on Thursday, May 4, 2006 at 8:30 AM
Categories: Copyright, Surveying, Tracerouting
The New Yorker on Road Maps and Directions
This week’s New Yorker has a long article by Nick Paumgarten on mapping, the principal focus of which is driving directions, but which has lots of little digressions into cognate areas like road maps (and their history) and digital mapping… »
Posted on Monday, April 17, 2006 at 9:46 AM
Categories: Driving Directions, Roads, Surveying
Again: Navteq in San Diego
Still another profile of a digital mapping data provider’s employees as they survey the streets of (insert your town name here): this time it’s Navteq in San Diego. Via Cartography, with whom I’m in agreement: where are all these stories… »
Posted on Wednesday, April 5, 2006 at 8:48 AM
Categories: Online Maps, Surveying
Another Profile: Navteq in New York
Stories about the digital mapping data companies keep coming in; the latest is a CNNMoney.com profile of Navteq in which the streets being profiled are New York’s. It’s from last month, but GPS Review spotted it today. I’m noticing a… »
Posted on Monday, March 27, 2006 at 9:07 PM
Categories: Online Maps, Surveying
TeleAtlas in Santa Fe
Another article on field data collection by the digital mapping data companies, this time from the Santa Fe New Mexican, looking at TeleAtlas’s work scouring the streets of Santa Fe. Via All Points Blog. See previous entries: More on Digital… »
Posted on Tuesday, March 21, 2006 at 8:27 AM
Categories: Online Maps, Surveying
More on Digital Map Field Researchers
Another look at the digital mapping data providers (i.e., NAVTEQ and TeleAtlas), how they collect their data on the ground, and how it ends up in the hands of Google, Yahoo, et al., from an Associated Press wire story that… »
Posted on Tuesday, December 27, 2005 at 8:09 AM
Categories: Online Maps, Surveying
CNet Profiles TeleAtlas
CNet’s Elinor Mills profiles TeleAtlas, one of several mapping data companies that provide the online map services with their data (along with NAVTEQ, for example, they provide data for both Google and Yahoo!). The article looks at data collection and… »
Posted on Friday, November 4, 2005 at 11:09 PM
Categories: Online Maps, Surveying
SF Chronicle: Digital Map Field Researchers
Today’s San Francisco Chronicle has a story about digital map data companies and their field researchers. I’ve mentioned stories about collecting data for map companies before (see previous entries: Online Maps’ Foot Soldiers; Backcountry Mapping). What’s different is the technology… »
Posted on Monday, October 3, 2005 at 9:55 AM
Categories: Online Maps, Surveying
Maps in Our Lives
Through January 6, a Library of Congress exhibition in the corridors of the Madison Building called Maps in Our Lives: “The exhibition explores four constituent professions represented by ACSM [the American Congress on Surveying and Mapping], the nation’s primary professional… »
Posted on Thursday, September 29, 2005 at 11:10 AM
Categories: Exhibitions, Surveying
NOAA’s Historical Map and Chart Collection
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… »
Posted on Sunday, September 18, 2005 at 7:29 AM
Categories: Antique Maps, Nautical, Surveying, Topo Maps & Trails
LA Times: Maps Outpaced by Suburban Growth
From today’s edition of the LA Times, a story about how maps can’t keep up with the pace of suburban growth in fast-growing areas like California, Nevada and Arizona. Some of those areas add thousands of new streets a year…. »
Posted on Sunday, August 21, 2005 at 11:05 AM
Categories: Cities, Online Maps, Roads, Surveying
Russian Geodetic Datum Point Preserved
Russian cartography enthusiasts have managed to save what I think is a geodetic datum point, used in the mapping of Russia during the 19th century, the St. Petersburg Times reports. Such points were the basis around which topographical maps were… »
Posted on Thursday, July 21, 2005 at 10:41 PM
Categories: Surveying
A Few Pages About Theodolites
Theodolites are surveying equipment used in triangulation. They’ve turned up on a couple of web pages recently: Ethel the Frog wants to know how to use one, and Languagehat looks at the origins of the word (see also)…. »
Posted on Sunday, June 19, 2005 at 1:46 PM
Categories: Surveying
19th-Century Surveying and Mapping Equipment
The Topographical Engineering Detachment — they’re sort of an SCA for 19th-century U.S. Army engineers — has this dead-interesting page of surveying and mapping equipment from the 1800s. Old photographs and descriptions. Via ba’s comment on MetaFilter…. »
Posted on Monday, December 27, 2004 at 5:44 PM
Categories: Surveying
Triangulation Pillars
Another article from Nicholas Crane based on his BBC series, “The Map Man” — this time in the Telegraph. This one’s about the Ordnance Survey’s triangulation pillars, the use of which in surveys eventually resulted in a series of one-inch-scale… »
Posted on Monday, November 1, 2004 at 9:39 PM
Categories: Surveying
Backcountry Mapping
Last year there was a story about the people on the ground who do the surveying for the online mapping services (see previous entry). Now there’s a story about the people who do something similar in the middle of nowhere,… »
Posted on Thursday, October 28, 2004 at 8:50 AM
Categories: Surveying

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