The New Cartographers

 Interesting article by Emily Underwood in Science Magazine 

The New Cartographer

"Geographers have traditionally studied how the natural environment contributes to human society and vice versa, whereas cartographers have focused more explicitly on the art and science of mapmaking. Over the past couple of decades, a new field has emerged: geographical information systems (GIS), blending the study and expression of geographic information. Cartography and geography have overlapped and spawned innumerable subspecialties and applications. Modern geographers and cartographers are involved in diverse projects: tracking fleets of vehicles or products, helping customers locate a Dunkin' Donuts, modeling environmental scenarios such as oil spills, and studying the spread of disease."

more online

Old SF Interactive GeoPhoto Map

Check out Old SF, an interactive map of about 13,000 geocoded historical images of the city from The San Francisco Public Library's Historical Photograph Collection. Created by Dan Vanderkam and Raven Keller, the site includes photos as far back as 1850, whick you can select for via a sliding scale. 

New Map Tool and Widgets: What’s Your Coastal Flood Risk?

This new interactive website SurgingSeas, a project of Climate Central, lets you see the combined coastal flood threat from sea level rise and storm surge, town by town and city by city from coast to coast. Type in your Zip code or the name of your community, choose a water level anywhere from 1 to 10 feet above the current high-tide line, and you can see what areas might be at risk of flooding from water that high. You can also go to any one of 55 tide gauges we studied around the country, and see the odds we’ve calculated for how soon flood waters may reach different elevations as the sea continues to rise. There are gauges close to most major coastal cities. If you want to embed the map in your own blog or website, there’s a widget for that, and you can make any view your default — not just the national one. - Michael D. Lemonick

India-Pakistan border as seen from space

From NASA re-posted via Bostom.com's The Big Picture photojournalist website comes this fascinating, geographically-pertinent image: "The India-Pakistan border appears as an orange line in this photograph taken by the Expedition 28 crew on the International Space Station on August 21, 2011. The fence between the two countries is floodlit for surveillance purposes. Srinagar (left), Islamabad (bottom center), Lahore (center near the border line) and Delhi (top center) can be seen as brighter spots. (NASA/Handout/Reuters)#"

GovMaps.org Launches

This new website, GovMaps.org, offers yet another easy way to stream useful GIS data right into ArcGIS. NWI, historical fire data, zip codes, etc. are only a click away!

GIF Open House Today!

Thursday, September 2, 1-3 PM 

111 Mulford Hall

Check out new equipment and find out how mapping technology can enhance your research! 

The Geospatial Innovation Facility (http://gif.berkeley.edu) will be hosting an open house on Thursday, September 2 at 1PM.  Meet UC students, faculty, and staff who are interested in geospatial applications, and learn how the GIF can help you to utilize technologies including GIS, GPS, Remote Sensing, WebGIS, and 3D Visualization. 

Root beer floats will be available while supplies last!

ESRI ArcGIS iPhone App Now Available

I just downloaded the new ArcGIS iPhone app newly available this weekend. It's impressively speedy, especially over wifi. One of the best features I've noticed so far is the ability to measure distances and areas. It's also available for the iPad and iPodTouch.

Interactive Forbes Map: Where Americans are Moving

My productivity went out the window when a friend showed me this new interactive map from Forbes illustrating the inward and outward migration of Americans by county. It's fascinating to see which counties attract or repell, and even which counties are primarily static.

http://www.forbes.com/2010/06/04/migration-moving-wealthy-interactive-counties-map.html

Google Map of Red Shirt Conflict in Bangkok

This upto-date Google map of red shirt conflict in Bangkok gives an interesting spatial perspective on the events taking place. Travelling here, it's also a helpful navigation tool to get around the city. I write this from an apartment marked by the red teardrop just to the right of the action.

Link to Google Map Here

The Wandering 48

Radical Cartography's latest project the Wandering 48 is a beautiful illustration of the distorion inherent in projections.