Mile-by-mile map along the path of totality

On April 8, 2024, the moon is going to completely block the sun along a designated path. For the Washington Post, Dylan Moriarty and Kevin Schaul use a strip of satellite imagery to show the totality across the United States, with events and time along the way.

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Maps in the wild

For the New York Times, Eve Kahn describes the use of maps outside of looking up directions:

Cartographic décor can help sate fundamental human needs to feel oriented. “Maps are inherently trusted — there’s something about them that makes people feel secure,” said PJ Mode, a map scholar and collector who is donating his holdings to Cornell University. His main focus is “persuasive cartography”: maps meant to sway public opinion, for instance by advocating abolition in the early 1800s, or women’s suffrage or warmongering in the 1910s. Mr. Mode likes to quote what the writer and aviator Beryl Markham imagined that maps wanted to say to their users: “follow me closely, doubt me not. … Without me, you are alone and lost.”

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Mapping the crops with the most potential in a changing climate

The climate is changing, which means some crops will fair better or worse given new conditions. Stamen, in collaboration with Vision for Adapted Crops and Soils, mapped the potential shifts for a variety of crops.

Be sure to see Stamen’s process post on the design choices behind the visual explorer.

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Where to see the total eclipse

There’s a total eclipse (a real one, not of the heart) happening on April 8, 2024. The next one isn’t until 2045, so if you don’t want to wait two decades, now’s your chance. For Bloomberg, Denise Lu shows where, when, and how the eclipse will go down across the United States. She covered pretty much every angle, so there’s no need for anyone else to make an eclipse map.

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Rock map of Scotland

Harry Jefferies shared his grandfather’s 30-year project:

My grandpa who is 85 started making this rock map of Scotland in 1992. He collected rocks during amateur geology trips over 30 years. He says it had to be geologically correct and also aesthetically pleasing. He asked if I could share online as He wants to go viral so please share

Thirty years. I’m a sucker for slow data collection and physical visualization.

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Algorithmic road trip to visit a street named after each day of the year

Ben Ashforth set out to visit a street named after a day of the year for each date. He used OpenStreetMap to find the streets and then algorithmically routed a trip. Then he followed through and went on the trip. In a five-minute lightning talk, he describes the journey. See a photo for every day here. [via Waxy]

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Map of most common domesticated animals

Based on data from the USDA Census of Agriculture, this map by John Johnson shows the predominant domesticated animal in each county in the United States. It nonchalantly includes humans.

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Local wanderlust

Alastair Humphreys, using a 20 by 20 kilometer map of where he lives, explored one square kilometer at a time as if he were traveling farther. For the Guardian:

Travelling around my unremarkable map for a year gave me much to remark on. It was one of the most interesting journeys of my life and shifted my perspective on the way we choose to travel. It made me calmer and healthier. It fostered feelings of curiosity, awe, gratitude and a deeper awareness of nature than I had experienced before. The more you look, the more you see. The more you see, the more you learn and care. Your local map is a fractal of the world at large. Embrace it, care for it, cherish it, and discover it. You might just find that a single map is enough exploration for an entire lifetime.

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World railway map

Usually you see a railway map from a local perspective, because it’s meant to show how you get from point A to point B. As a learning experiment, Zhaoxu Sui mapped major railways worldwide. It’s not comprehensive but still interesting to think about, in case you’re trying to get to China from Europe by train.

You can grab the full PDF version here.

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Cost of a Big Mac at every McDonald’s in the United States

A map, by Pantry & Larder, shows the cost of a Big Mac at each McDonald’s in the United States, as of early 2023. As you might expect, the prices are higher on the east and west coasts. The most expensive Big Mac was in Lee, Massachusetts for $8.09. I assume shipping to Hawaii and Alaska brings prices up in those states.

But what’s going on in Montana and Arizona? Based on Regional Price Parity, Montana tends to cost less compared to the national average, and Arizona is right in the middle. Then again, when you adjust for cost of living, the two states are right next to each towards the bottom for income, so I guess it makes sense.

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