Detail Of The Best U.S.A. Map

If you’re the kind of person who prefers hard copy books to ebooks, we found something else you might appreciate. According to the Cartography and Geographic Information Society (CGIS), it’s the best paper map of the United States of America currently in existence. 

What makes a map so great? The winner of the “Best of Show” in the CGIS’s annual map design competition was judged “based on cartographic design criteria, such as creativity, text (spelling and grammar, too), balance, unity, clarity, use of color, and subject matter.”

In other words, it’s a masterpiece because of the attention to detail.

30 year veteran cartographer David Imus created this map all alone, working in a farmhouse outside Eugene, Oregon. It took him almost 6,000 hours.

Unfortunately, at the time of this post the servers at Imus’s website appear to be overwhelmed with visits, but hopefully once interest dies down a bit it will be possible to go there and purchase a copy. In the meantime you can visit this article at Slate to see an image of the whole map (the original is 4 feet wide) and several close up details, which allow greater appreciation of the meticulous work which went into the design.

It really is a marvel.

Notice the placement of highway numbers in the closeups, for example. Unlike the confusing spaghetti of roads shown on the vast majority of large scale maps, Imus made it possible to trace every road to its designation. You could actually use just this one image to navigate clear across the U.S.A.

And notice the ordered, consistent positioning of the place names. Somehow, Imus managed to get them all in without obscuring any important geographical information, while maintaining a standard orientation grid. Compared to the National Geographical Society’s versions shown in the Slate article, Imus’s map is just a breeze to read.

In a world where “handmade” and “craftsmanship” have become little more than buzz words used for advertising, it’s a pleasure to encounter such clear evidence that people are still out there with a passionate commitment to quality. We have no idea what David Imus’s religious beliefs are, but his map exemplifies the kind of commitment all Christians are commanded to have toward their work:

 ”Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men.” (Colossians 3:23)