SOT 7.5' topo scans at Archive.org
Marc Fannin
topographic maps is not news - they've been available at
http://terraserver-usa.com/ , http://www.topozone.com/ , etc., for
years, and are apparently also available at
http://seamless.usgs.gov/ , though I can't seem to get the right layer
to show up - until just now, I knew of no location that had scans of
the *entire maps* for the whole series nationwide, marginal
information included, which is important in tracing the history of
road locations, since the margins give the year or range of years to
which the map information corresponds (the respective collection at
the Ohio government website includes margins in the scans, for
example, but that of Michigan does not). It's at the same website as
our old standby, the Internet Wayback Machine:
http://items-uploads.archive.org/0/maps/
...or, if you know the map's code (involves lat/long plus a grid of
combination 1-8 and A-H: see the 7.5' zooms at
http://catalog.maplink.com/usgs/USMap.html , for example), you can go
to
http://www.archive.org/details.php?identifier=usgs_drg_*_**
where * is the state postal abbreviation, and ** is the code, with the
5-digit lat/long and alphanumeric code separated by and underscore
("_"), all in lowercase. Example: http://www.archive.org/details.php?identifier=usgs_drg_pa_39078_h2
_____________________________________________________________________
Marc Fannin|musxf579 @hotmail.com|http://www.roadfan.com/
e...@topozone.com
Free downloads of full-sheet images aren't new, either. They've been
available from the US Department of Agriculture for several years, and
their collection is more complete and up-to-date than the archive.org
version (which has a lot of maps, but is certainly not the "entire
maps for the whole series nationwide"). The topo maps are only one of
many free datasets that can be searched for and downloaded at the NRCS
Data Gateway site, at http://datagateway.nrcs.usda.gov
- Ed
Ed McNierney
TopoZone Map Guy
robcar
> Marc -
>
> Free downloads of full-sheet images aren't new, either. They've been
> available from the US Department of Agriculture for several years, and
> their collection is more complete and up-to-date than the archive.org
> version (which has a lot of maps, but is certainly not the "entire
> maps for the whole series nationwide"). The topo maps are only one of
> many free datasets that can be searched for and downloaded at the NRCS
>
> - Ed
>
> Ed McNierney
> TopoZone Map Guy
Now, when will all of the historic editions of each 7.5 minute quad
across the country be available on the internet? I still have to
trudge to the nearest university map collection when I do my research
on the history of highway routings. Sure would be nice to be able to
do it all from my computer....
e...@topozone.com
> On Feb 18, 1:13 pm, e...@topozone.com wrote:
>
> > Marc -
>
> > Free downloads of full-sheet images aren't new, either. They've been
> > available from the US Department of Agriculture for several years, and
> > their collection is more complete and up-to-date than the archive.org
> > version (which has a lot of maps, but is certainly not the "entire
> > maps for the whole series nationwide"). The topo maps are only one of
> > many free datasets that can be searched for and downloaded at the NRCS
> > Data Gateway site, athttp://datagateway.nrcs.usda.gov
>
> > - Ed
>
> > Ed McNierney
>
> Now, when will all of the historic editions of each 7.5 minute quad
> across the country be available on the internet? I still have to
> trudge to the nearest university map collection when I do my research
> on the history of highway routings. Sure would be nice to be able to
> do it all from my computer....
Well, how much would you pay for that service? There are lots of
people interested in historic topos, but acquiring them and scanning
them is a very expensive proposition. I don't know of anyone who
thinks that it's economically feasible to spend that much money to set
up something that perhaps a lot of people want but that (we think)
very few people would actually pay for. Just as a ballpark figure,
even if you acquired all the map sheets for free you would probably
spend around half a million dollars just to get high-quality,
georeferenced scans made.
- Ed
Paul D. DeRocco
I don't see how to get to the topo data. It's behaving as though you have to
have a user account to get beyond zooming and panning the overview map.
--
Ciao, Paul D. DeRocco
Paul mailto:pder...@ix.netcom.com
robcar
>
> - Show quoted text -
I don't doubt that it's expensive. I'd be willing to pay something
like a hundred bucks/year subscription fee for it, but don't know how
many others would.
Seems to me it is something that USGS should do as a public service at
some point. But I'm sure it's not super high on their list. They
MUST (translate that as "better") have some sort of project to
digitize all of their historic topos simply to preserve the
information for their in-house historical archives, even if they don't
ever make them available to the public via the net. It would be a
dereliction of duty for them not to.
PatOConnell
Many map repositories are just that, places where old maps are stored in
drawers. I've been to the New Mexico map repository, and that's all it
was. There were no large format scanners either, though you could copy
an 11 by 17 inch part of a map at 10 cents a page (probably more now,
it's been awhile), black and white.
On the other hand, The University of Nevada (Reno) has color scans
available over the Internet of the current topo maps for Nevada. I think
those topos are free to download (no I don't have the URL, that PC died
recently), but I don't know if older quads are available.