I'm from a mining town in northern Canada. Many find it a boring place. This piece made me realize my town has in its shadows, a network of walking trails, easily found with topo maps on my phone. All this to say, you peaked my interest in learning more on UK's history of Ordinance Survey OS and realizing my town may not be so boring after all.
Ah that’s a lovely thing to say, thank you. I’m sure your town is *fascinating*. I’m always very intimidated by the things that North Americans classify as ‘hiking’ - in my part of England you’re lucky if you achieve an increase in elevation of more than 50 feet on a ten mile walk.
Lovely piece Rowan! The US Geological Survey topo maps are free online and you can build your own with their "topoBuilder" - this came in very handy for a train journey/project I'm working on. So much great stuff out there :)
Thanks Mags! Yes, I very much wanted the answer to my question to be ‘the OS is the only thing of its kind in the world’ but no, that turned out to be totally untrue (dammit). Your project sounds intriguing…
Thank you Jacqueline. Yes, as you say, I think OS has a long and not very glorious history in Ireland - I think one of the original uses of detailed mapping in Britain was to plot the land that would be taken away from Irish people and given to British soldiers after the Cromwellian wars. There’s a very good chapter in Anna Keay’s ‘Restless Republic’ about this.
I love the hand-drawn maps, feels a bit like Middle Earth. But why the dog? The whole piece reminds me of the campus midnight walks in York, the stepping stones, UFO, up to the mushroom and the haunted post-industrial chateau etc... We didn't need a dog to walk (we could hardly walk ourselves) for fascinating discoveries and wonder. I guess 35 odd years also means that our old minds need someone to "play" the curious discoverer for us, and a dog seems as good a choice as any (e.g. kids).
I didn't actually walk very much at York tbh. I remember being really *tired* after walking into town/back from town - a distance that I now realise is only about a mile or so. V interesting about the role of dogs and children though - I really like the idea of 'playing the curious discoverer'
Is the OSM free data up to date on footpaths in your area? At first glance
https://www.openstreetmap.org/#map=16/51.36433/-0.39291 seems quite comprehensive.
Aha, yes - it does look pretty accurate
I'm from a mining town in northern Canada. Many find it a boring place. This piece made me realize my town has in its shadows, a network of walking trails, easily found with topo maps on my phone. All this to say, you peaked my interest in learning more on UK's history of Ordinance Survey OS and realizing my town may not be so boring after all.
Ah that’s a lovely thing to say, thank you. I’m sure your town is *fascinating*. I’m always very intimidated by the things that North Americans classify as ‘hiking’ - in my part of England you’re lucky if you achieve an increase in elevation of more than 50 feet on a ten mile walk.
Lovely piece Rowan! The US Geological Survey topo maps are free online and you can build your own with their "topoBuilder" - this came in very handy for a train journey/project I'm working on. So much great stuff out there :)
Thanks Mags! Yes, I very much wanted the answer to my question to be ‘the OS is the only thing of its kind in the world’ but no, that turned out to be totally untrue (dammit). Your project sounds intriguing…
Brilliant. Ireland has an Ordnance Survey too (thanks to the Brits) but I don't think we have an app, although you can still buy paper maps I think.
Thank you Jacqueline. Yes, as you say, I think OS has a long and not very glorious history in Ireland - I think one of the original uses of detailed mapping in Britain was to plot the land that would be taken away from Irish people and given to British soldiers after the Cromwellian wars. There’s a very good chapter in Anna Keay’s ‘Restless Republic’ about this.
I love the hand-drawn maps, feels a bit like Middle Earth. But why the dog? The whole piece reminds me of the campus midnight walks in York, the stepping stones, UFO, up to the mushroom and the haunted post-industrial chateau etc... We didn't need a dog to walk (we could hardly walk ourselves) for fascinating discoveries and wonder. I guess 35 odd years also means that our old minds need someone to "play" the curious discoverer for us, and a dog seems as good a choice as any (e.g. kids).
I didn't actually walk very much at York tbh. I remember being really *tired* after walking into town/back from town - a distance that I now realise is only about a mile or so. V interesting about the role of dogs and children though - I really like the idea of 'playing the curious discoverer'