Map of the Week-US Population Change

It's that time again when redistricting claims much of my time at work. I don't work directly with the overall US population figures, but I've been exposed to lots of ugly, poorly designed maps showing population change across the country. This map from Brookings Institute Demographer William H. Frey is one of the better ones though it's not clear if he's using the final 2010 Census figures or one of the estimates.

The resulting patterns are fairly predictable and consistent with previous decades. The ring around Minneapolis nicely exemplifies the exurban migration that may finally be starting to ebb a bit. The continuing growth of areas with the poorest access to fresh water is not really news but shows up clearly.

What is interesting is how many counties are losing population. The population loss in the Great Plains is old news but the huge number of counties in the less than 10% loss category is surprising. Unfortunately the pattern is lost a bit by the dull color choice for that category.

Maps in Unexpected Places-Savannah Part 2

As promised here is part 2 of the Savannah edition of Maps in Unexpected Places.
Vic's on the River is a restaurant in an old warehouse, that was used by General Sherman's officers as a planning space. The main dining room showcases a map drawn by Union soldiers in the Civil War detailing Sherman's march from Tennessee through Georgia. The map was discovered during a renovation drawn onto the wall. For protection, it is framed under glass. The romantic dining lighting is poor for photography but here are some pictures I attempted. I can't find any good images of this map online so these photos are the best I have. First, the explanatory text.

The northern part of the map shows Chattanooga, Lookout Mountain, and the Georgia, Tennessee border region.

Lookout Mountain.

 

Some details a little further east. 

Oh and by the way, the food is excellent, too. Come for the map, stay for dinner.

Maps on Album Covers-Reader Suggestions

My recent "Maps on Album Covers" post was as incomplete as my music collection. Fortunately you folks stepped up and gave me some great suggestions. Here they are:

Hell's Ditch - The Pogues

Wisconsin by the Crucifucks

The Ambient series by Brian Eno is all kinds of mappy.

Coming Home by Maggie Bjorklund

No Borders Here - Jane Siberry, although the version I accidentally downloaded from her site has a different cover.

More globe than map but here's Soul Rotation by the vastly underappreciated Dead Milkmen.








This is not the front cover but apparently XTC's Colin Moulding has some nice cartographic skills. This is from Go 2.

The back cover of More Songs about Buildings and Food by Talking Heads. I'm not sure what this map is showing.

Map of the Week-Enclavistan

A recent article in The Economist, titled The Land that Maps Forgot highlights the complex nature of the northern border between India and Bangladesh. The countries have been negotiating a possible land swap in order to solve the problem of enclaves -  islands of Indian and Bangladeshi territory within the opposite country. There are also counter enclaves (islands within islands) as well as the world's only counter-counter enclave.

This detail of the Cooch Behar district shows the border with Indian enclaves in pink and Bangladeshi enclaves in green. Some counter enclaves are apparent such as the ones numbered 33 and 41. These are Bangladeshi areas within Bangladesh, but surrounded by Indian territory.

The full map is shown below. The age of this map is not clear from the article or from its source page but Bangladesh is "East Pakistan" so it's at least 40 years old and may date back to the original partition of Pakistan.

Thanks to my brother (aka "your brother") for his diligent reading of The Economist.