BCS President’s Monthly Bulletin November 2013

Society AGM and talk

The Society held it’s AGM on 25th November preceded by an EGM to consider a new category of membership. The Restless Earth schools programme is proving to be continually popular and the EGM passed the motion to create a new membership category of ‘Educational’. Five schools have already signed up as members and we hope to get more during the year. I will continue my monthly bulletins as I was elected to a second term of office as President and I would like to welcome Dr Alex Kent from Canterbury University as our new Vice President. There was competition for places on Council this year and I would like to congratulate David Forrest, Richard Carpenter and Steve Lambe for being re-elected and welcome our newest Council member, Jane Sprague. Over 100 ballot papers were returned this year, so thanks to all those who cast their votes.

I am also delighted to report that the AGM confirmed two new Honorary Fellows of BCS, Ann Sutherland, the convener of the Map Curators Special Interest Group for longer than I can remember, and Seppe Cassettari, former President of the Society. Congratulations to both Ann and Seppe on their well-deserved recognition. I was pleased to be able to present Ann with her certificate and citation at the AGM (it was the first time that I have ever known Ann speechless) and Seppe with his a few days later at the London Mapping Showcase.

Our guest speaker after the AGM was Nicholas Crane, the TV presenter and author. Nick gave us a fascinating insight into how maps have influenced his career and life. He also proved himself to be the master of understatement recalling how he made “a little bike ride across the Gobi Desert’” and commenting that “there are some quite big hills” in the Himalayas. All in all it provided a very fitting end to the Society’s 50th Anniversary year.

Anniversaries

Well, there is certainly no shortage of other 50th anniversaries for November, the most well publicised of which was probably Dr Who. Featured heavily on BBC for the last couple of months the 50th anniversary episode starred the last two Doctors, Matt Smith and David Tennant as well as the ‘War Doctor’, John Hurt. With plot twists that even the most ardent fan probably hadn’t seen coming the episode lived up to all the hype, well at least for this avid Doctor Who fan it did. I can remember the original Doctor played by William Hartnell and although I can’t say definitely that I saw the first episode (I was only 5) I do remember hiding behind an armchair when the Daleks appeared later in the series.

I know Ken Field has said that enough is enough, with all the ‘rip offs’ of the London Underground map and I must agree with him that many of them just use the format for the sake of it, but the one illustrated in part above is the exception to the rule. The complex interconnections of the 11 incarnations of the Time Lord are probably to be expected given that all laws of time and physics are bent out of shape, but the designer has done a great job of summarising a bewilderingly complex set of relationships. The full map can be purchased as a poster, for full details check out the website.
 

Fifty years ago there was a fairly dramatic requirement for maps and charts to be redrawn, when the island of Surtsey was created by volcanic action off the south coast of Iceland. It was formed by a volcanic eruption just over 400 feet below sea level and reached the surface in mid-November. Activity continued for 4 years and Surtsey reached a maximum size of just under 3 sq kms. Since the volcanic activity has stopped the island has shrunk due to erosion and is losing about 1 hectare of its area each year.

Plant life has colonised the island and although these are mostly mosses and lichens, 69 species have now been recorded with an annual increase of 2 or 3 per year. Migratory birds are using the island and there are both gull and puffin colonies. Seals are also common. It’s particularly pleasing to note that human impact is minimal with only a small prefabricated hut used on a part-time basis by researchers.

Iceland is the only spot where a mid-ocean ridge can be seen above water. Mid-ocean ridges are the seams that bisect the oceanic plates where magma comes up from the mantle below to form new crust. They are continuous lines of major volcanic activity, creating new ocean floor at rates up to 15 cm per year. 

In order for people to remember and report on your death it’s obviously best for it not to coincide with one of the most iconic incidents of the 20th Century. It is said that everyone can remember where they were when the news of President Kennedy’s assassination was announced. Over the years many maps have been produced to show the relationship of the book depository to the Presidential motorcade and whether or not shots fired from the ‘grassy knoll’ were feasible or simply a matter of conjecture and conspiracy theory.  Even now, 50 years after the event, those conspiracy theories still abound and as well as Doctor Who taking over our TVs, there were also a fair few programmes about that fateful day in downtown Dallas. 
On the same day, two very significant authors also died, C.S. Lewis, the author most famous for the Narnia books, and Aldous Huxley, author of Brave New World. Their fate went relatively unreported however as the assassination of an American President was the only thing being covered by the news channels at the time.

The illustration is of the map of Narnia composed by the original illustrator Pauline Baynes.

Cartography in the News

The UXblog from IDV solutions came to my attention this month with its list of 20 unrequested map tips. Whilst I don’t necessarily agree with all of them, there is a lot of common sense and for anyone looking for some simple and effective ways to improve their maps, this is not a bad place to start. http://uxblog.idvsolutions.com/

What makes a map bad? This is potentially a contentious question as what will appeal to some may horrify others and as with many forms of art, there is a great deal of subjectivity. I think we can agree, however, that poor design is likely to lead to a poor map. A recent article at http://gis.stackexchange.com/questions/3087/what-makes-a-map-be-classed-as-badly-designed is worth a read for some of the topics it explores and as the author says, “A poorly designed map can not only look visually unappealing, but can convey the wrong message, which could lead to bad decisions being made.”

In order to be completely objective there are those who would defend ‘bad maps’, even if they can’t spell ‘Defence’. 
The blog at http://www.axismaps.com/blog/ makes some valid points and reminds us that we shouldn’t be too judgmental or act as the ‘carto police’.

Enough said? Although I am still puzzling over the description of “a less than traditional road”, I’m not sure I have ever seen that classification used on a map. A Road, B Road, Unclassified, Less than traditional – you never know, it might catch on.

Jane Tomlinson’s Map of Oxford

I must admit to being a sucker for a hand-drawn map and as an Oxfordshire lad as well, I was particularly taken with the map of Oxford produced by Jane Tomlinson. I contacted Jane and she kindly sent me an extract and gave permission for it to be used in this issue of the bulletin. Jane is an artist rather than a cartographer, but has put down her paint and brushes and taken up a pen and ink to draw by hand a map of Oxford, the city she adopted as home nearly 30 years ago. 

There will always be a degree of subjectivity about what is and isn’t included, especially when you have a city like Oxford with such a rich history. I’m impressed that it only took Jane 9 weeks to complete the research and work out what to include and what of necessity to leave out. Her website includes the statement, “The map of Oxford is (she says) the ’final’ map she will draw. (But she’s said that before…)”. I do hope not as there are a lot more places that lend themselves to this sort of depiction.

Copies at A2 size are available to purchase at www.janetomlinson.com

GeoDATA 2013

Having attended four of the GeoDATA events run by the GeoInformation Group this year I can say how great they have been for promoting the message that BCS has to get across and for offering the opportunity for some fascinating networking across the whole cartographic and GI community.

The series of GeoDATA events culminated with the Mapping Showcase in London attended by over 100 exhibitors and with over 650 registered delegates. The BCS stand proved to be very popular and although we had four members manning the stand we were all kept very busy. There was a steady stream of enquiries all day long and we talked to a lot of people. We signed up 12 new members, which took us over 100 new members for the year.

An interesting trend emerged from those we talked to as many were from the Local Government sector. A couple of years ago we considered the idea of setting up a Local Government Special Interest Group, but it didn’t really gain traction as we struggled to identify what the key themes would be. Given the obvious interest in cartography and the need to provide training and resources, I have asked the Membership Committee to see what we can do to engage with this community. It may result in the establishment of a new SIG or it might be something less formal such as a discussion group. To enable us to best identify what is required we would love to hear from you if you work in the Local Government sector. Please contact me at the e-mail below, so that we can target our initial consultation

Pete Jones MBE, CGeog, FRGS

30th November 2013

Email: Peter.Jones991@mod.uk

Twitter: @geomapnut

Postscript

Not for real, but it made me smile.

BCS President’s Report September 2012

I hope you all enjoyed the summer break. September started with a Council meeting in London on the 6^th. You will be pleased to know that the Society’s finances are sound and the membership is up again. We are looking at ways of reducing the overall costs of producing Maplines and we’ve decided to delay the re-branding process until 2014 but we will be updating the marketing material to reflect our 50^th Anniversary next year. The 2013 programme is coming together and there will be some exceptional events.

Summer Maplines

I hope you’ve all had the summer edition of Maplines by now – another excellent effort by the Maplines team. The cut-off date for articles for the winter edition is 16 October so please get those articles to the editors as soon as you can.

We had a stand at the recent AGI conference in Nottingham and our thanks go to our hosts the AGI and to Hugo Boylan and David Cooper who helped to man the stand. I think we should get a few more members following this event. The schools Restless Earth team have just got back from 2 days in Penarth. We did 2 sessions on the Wednesday and 2 on Thursday which meant that over 200 students took part in the exercise. We’ve been invited back next year so the staff and students must have been pleased. This time we had help from RGS ambassadors and students from the University of Glamorgan for which we are very grateful.

There is a GIS SIG meeting on 24 October which is being held at the British Computer Society offices, which are just off the Strand, and entitled, 'Experiences of working with commercial and open source data and software'. It promises to be a really useful and informative afternoon so do come and join us. Details, of course, are on the BCS website.  

On 26 October there is another schools Restless Earth Workshop this time in Sandhurst. The final event in October is our AGM, Lecture and dinner in the RAF Club on the 31^st, again details are on the website and Roger Hore will be sending out the paperwork shortly.

And lastly, if you heard the short piece I did with Eddie Mair on the Radio 4 pm programme you may have gathered that I had to use the atlas index to establish the precise location of Uttoxeter – my apologies to any members who live there!

And if you are short of ideas for a Christmas, well membership of BCS might be appreciated?

Best Wishes

Peter Jolly
President of The British Cartographic Society

BCS President's Report June 2012

www.facebook.com/bcsweb

The main event in June was, of course, the Symposium held in Basingstoke, well, just outside Basingstoke at the Basingstoke Country Hotel near Hook. The Symposium was preceded by a Restless Earth Schools Workshop and a meeting of the GIS SIG during which presentations were given on the use of GIS by Charities.All-in-all it was indeed a great event, the atmosphere was so friendly and everywhere you looked there were groups of people talking. More importantly it was the third year in succession that the number of attendees had increased by 10% and still more importantly 40% of those who attended were first-timers. Our Corporate members made a great contribution too as 25% of them, 20 in all, took the opportunity to have a stand, twice as many as last year. My thanks once again to our sponsors of the event: Cadcorp, EsriUK, Leica Geosystems, Europa Technologies, Victoria Litho, Star-Apic, Newgrove, Ordnance Survey and Global Mapping. So thank you to all who attended, the speakers and all those involved in the organisation.

On 19 June there was a one day Better Mapping course in Leeds. A week before the event only 11 people had registered for the course and we, BCS and our partners AGI, seriously considered cancelling it. However, ‘we didn’t get where we are today by giving up’ and as happens so often these days there were a number of people who registered late in the day and we had 21 on the course in the end.
The next Better Mapping event will be held in The British Computer Society offices in London on 26 July. All the details are on the BCS website: http://www.cartography.org.uk/bettermapping

On 21 June the BCS/RGS team were in Northampton delivering a Schools Restless Earth Workshop. There were 2 sessions with 75 students taking part in the morning and 65 in the afternoon. Assuming we do 2 of these Workshops each month during term time as we’ve done this financial year we now have some idea of the annual cost and will be seeking sponsorship in the coming months.

We held a Council meeting on 28 June in London when the main topic was the preparations for 2013, BCS’s 50^th Anniversary. We have lots of good ideas, a special book, attendance at the ICC in Dresden, lectures etc. There should be about one event a month. When our plans are firm-up we will, of course, make them easily available. June 30 is our financial year end and it looks as though we will end the year with a small surplus, which is good as we’ll be spending a little more in 2013 on the 50^th Anniversary celebrations. We have 606 paid up members this calendar year, so far, which includes 47 new members which is really good news.

Finally, don’t forget nominations for Council have to be submitted by 1 August - 2013 will be a great year to be on the Council.

Best Wishes

Peter Jolly

President of The British Cartographic Society

BCS President's Report March 2012

March has been another busy month. We have carried out Restless Earth Workshops for schools in the Chatham and Banbury areas all of which have been well-received and much appreciated by the students who have taken part. Once again the mentors were from both BCS and the RGS Ambassadors and, therefore, my thanks to you all. We also had a stand at GEO 12 which was held in the middle of the month at the Holiday Inn at Elstree and our thanks go to PV Publications for that.

On the very positive side we’ve had 25 new members so far this year. However, there are a number of our existing members who have yet to pay their subscriptions. Please do pay as soon as you are able – you can do do so through our secure website at www.cartography.org.uk and on the Home page click on Membership Renew.  Thank you.

 

As you are aware it is the BCS’s 50^th Anniversary next year and we are planning to produce a special book to celebrate the event entitled something like, ‘The British Cartographic Society 50^th Anniversary Book’.  Martin Lubikowski, Nick Millea, Seppe Cassettari and I have drawn up an outline plan. To be fair Martin has drawn up the plan! We have identified significant events in the British Isles and internationally for each year from 1963 to 2012 (see list). Now we want to find maps that relate to those events. We would be delighted if any of you could provide suitable maps which preferably should be scanned and sent to Martin Lubikowski [mldesign@btclick.com]. Any paper copy should be sent to Nick Millea at the Bodleian Library. We would, of course, also need the permission of the copyright holder to allow BCS to publish the map. If you wish to be involved please send your contributions by the 30 April – thanks in advance. Also, if you have any old photographs of members of the Society at ‘work’ that you think might be suitable for the book we’d be interested to see those too.

April will be another busy month. BCS has a stand at GISRUK which is at Lancaster University this year and David Forrest will be looking after that. The following week is the London Book Fair and I hope to see some of you there on Monday the 16^th. On Tuesday there is a Restless Earth Workshop in Hackney and on Wednesday a Council meeting in London. My own programme also includes an Airport Summit in Brussels and attendance at the IHO Conference in Monte Carlo.

I hope you have had a chance to read the programme for the Symposium in June which is full of excellent sessions, workshops and presentations. Do register, if you can, before 2 May so that you get the benefit of the ‘Early Bird’ rates.

Finally, there will be the usual round of elections for Council and nomination forms will be sent out with the next edition of Maplines towards the end of April. So if you would like to be closely involved with the work and development of the Society now’s the time to think about seeking nomination.

Best Wishes

Peter Jolly

President of The British Cartographic Society

BCS President's Report February 2012

It’s the time of year here in the UK when we begin to think about summer holidays - which prompted me to think about all our BCS overseas members. I hope you are all well and enjoying life.

Furthermore I’m delighted to say that 4 overseas speakers will be giving presentations at our forthcoming Symposium in Basingstoke from 13-15 June. They are from Poland, France, Sweden and the USA. The full programme for the Symposium should be available on the website within the next few days. It’s completed but just waiting for final approval from the Programme Committee. Do please take time to look at it and I’m sure you’ll find that there are many sessions, some or all of which, are bound to be of interest.

The Council met on 7 February in London. The major points that resulted from that meeting are as follows:

• the finances are sound and we ended 2011 with 628 members,
• the UKCC review paper was accepted,
• the Membership Committee will consider the possibility of re-branding the Society,
• the 2012 programme is well in hand and a draft programme for 2013 is being refined,
• the Publications Committee reported that they had plenty of material for both the next editions of the Cartographic Journal and Maplines
• and all the SIGS have events planned for 2012

During the month the Society conducted 2 Restless Earth Workshops as planned, one for schools near Chipping Norton and the other for schools in Kendal, both of which went very well. When asked what the students liked best, typical of the answers was: “The teamwork, I really enjoyed looking at maps and feeling like we were actually planning it all.”

Next month we have 2 more Restless Earth Workshops in Chatham and Banbury and I’m sure with the help of our RGS ambassadors they too will be a great success.

We also have a stand at the GEO 12 event in Elstree, 21-22 March, where we will be endeavouring to encourage more people to join the Society. I’m delighted to say that Alan Grimwade, MD of Cosmographics Ltd, has taken over as the Corporate Member representative.

There are 2 other things I’ve been asked to include in this report. First of all, entries for the Map Awards should be submitted by 31 March and second, if you haven’t paid your annual subscription yet then please do so as soon as you are able.

On a lighter note, Rob Sharpe one of our Council members, married Emily Martin last Saturday. Congratulations to Mr and Mrs Sharpe.

Best Wishes

Peter Jolly

President of The British Cartographic Society
http://www.cartography.org.uk/symposium

BCS President's Report January 2012

I hope you all enjoyed the Christmas break and a Very Happy New Year.

The UKCC met on 10 Jan in London and the second draft of the Review will be circulated prior to the next Council meeting on 7 Feb. The Review seeks to clarify the financial arrangements and ensure that there is a proper return for members for monies spent.

The London Mapping Festival (LMF) Steering Group met on 17 Jan to discuss the programme for the coming year. Details will be available on the LMF website in due course.

BCS had a stand at the DGI Conference in London on 24-25 Jan and hopefully we will have some more new members as a result. THE UK GEOForum met the following day and that evening the Annual Lecture was given by Mike Parker the author of the book, ‘Map Addict’ – an excellent book and an equally enjoyable lecture.

Chipping Norton, then Kendal

The 2012 Restless Earth Schools programme starts next month with visits to schools in Chipping Norton and Kendal. Hopefully, we will have some support again from local RGS Ambassadors.

Thanks to all those who submitted abstracts of papers for the forthcoming Symposium in June. I’m told that it’s going to be difficult to include all the papers in the time available but the Programme Committee will be doing their best as always.

The cut-off date for submission of articles for the next edition of Maplines is 14 Feb. See our notes for contributors if you need any guidance.

As you may recall John Peaty from DGC has taken over as convener of the HMMG. Roger Hore has emailed all known HMMG members so if you haven’t had the email and wish to be involved please contact John on the HMMG contact form. The first suggested event is the Defence Surveyors Association Annual Seminar at Hermitage on 16 June.

We attracted 90 new members to the Society last year and only 40 members decided not to re-new their subscriptions which is a really pleasing result. So far this year we’ve had 9 new members so membership stands at about 630. Let’s try to make it 700 by the end of 2012.

The Council meets on 7 Feb in London and I’ll let you know about that meeting in my next report.

Best Wishes

Peter Jolly

BCS President

BCS President’s Report September 2011

As is usual September began with a flourish. 


The UKCC met in York on Monday 5 September. The main topics raised were: first, the ICC in Paris - David Forrest gave a report on the work of the General Assembly and all had an opportunity to comment on the organisation of the event.  The UK won 2 awards, Best Thematic Map – Ken Field and Best Educational Cartographic Product (Digital) – HarperCollins. Second, there were reports from Commission chairs and vice-chairs and lastly, there was an initial discussion on the UKCC Review. A draft paper has been circulated to Council for comment by 30 September prior to a second draft. In future, details of the UKCC’s work and ICA events, commission reports etc will be posted on the BCS website for all to see. Work on this has already begun.

The following day the Council also met at the same venue. This was a routine meeting covering membership and finance, the UKCC Review, Committee and SIG reports. There was also a discussion about having a lunchtime event for Fellows in the spring next year and that discussion is on-going.
On Wednesday the Map Curator’s Group met and I understand had a very successful meeting. My thanks go to Ann Sutherland, April Carlucci, Anne Taylor and Paula Williams for running and organising the event.

We, BCS, have a stand at the AGI Geocommunity ’11 conference in Nottingham 21-22 September. This will be another opportunity to encourage attendees to join BCS. Over the last 12 months membership has increased significantly, up to 657 compared with 615 at the same time last year and, as a result, in part, the financial position of the Society has strengthened. As well as new members from the UK we have new members from Chile, Nigeria, USA and Australia.

FREE attendance for Year 10s

On Monday, 26 September, the BCS team led by Peter Jones, will be presenting the ‘Restless Earth’ package to the year 10 students at Lampton School, Hounslow, in the morning and about 70 students from other schools in the area in the afternoon. It should be a great day.

The following day the UK GEOForum meets at Canary Wharf to discuss matters of mutual interest to the 15 member societies. These meetings are always useful as we can discuss and debate the common concerns.

Next, the cut-off date for submission of articles for the Winter edition of Maplines is 13 October so please make sure that if you have a contribution to make that Lynda Bailey and her team get the information and photographs etc on time. I should also tell you that Martin Lubikowski has taken over as the chairman of the Publications Committee. Our thanks go to Peter Collier for the work he did as Martin’s predecessor.

November 1 is an important date for your diary. There will be a curry lunch in the RAF Club followed by the GIS SIG. The SIG is open to everyone and is entitled, ‘GIS and Schematic Mapping’. These maps are particularly popular in the transport industry and at the end of the sessions we should know more about their uses, advantages and limitations so please do come and join in. There will also be a report of the recent ICC in Paris by David Forrest which again should be of interest to all. Then it will be time for the AGM at which the election results for Council for the coming year will be announced. Roger Hore will be sending out all the necessary paper work shortly. All booking details are on the BCS website.

So, a busy time for all but very worthwhile.

Best Wishes

Peter Jolly
BCS President

BCS President's Report August 2011

I know it’s still July but here are a couple of reminders which might be helpful. 

First, nominations for Council have to be in by 1 August and second, the early-bird bookings for the Map Curators Group meeting in York, 7-9 September have to be made by 1 August too.

Whilst August is a quiet month for events, September is quite the opposite. The UK Cartographic Committee and the BCS Council both meet in York on 5 and 6 September respectively and I’ve already mentioned the MCG meeting at the same location. 

Some BCS members will be going to The IMTA(Americas) event in Palm Springs, 11-14 September. The following week the AGI holds its Annual Conference, 21-22 September in Nottingham. On 26 September we are running the BCS Schools Workshop at Lampton School, Hounslow, for up to 40 teams of 5 students which is both exciting and potentially exhausting!

The following day the UK GEOForum holds its meeting at Canary Wharf. Enjoy a quiet August, if circumstances allow, and I look forward to seeing you at the forthcoming events.

Peter Jolly

BCS President