BCS President's Report May 2013

31st May 2013

Lots of anniversaries this month, so no problem at all in filling space or having to scratch around for tenuous links to historic moments.

On the 17th May 1943, 19 Lancasters from 617 Squadron took off from RAF Scampton on Operation CHASTISE, better known simply as the "Dambusters Raid". The 70th anniversary was marked by a number of events including the "Battle of Britain Memorial Flight" Lancaster PA474 conducting a flypast over Derwent Water Reservoir in the Peak District, one of the reservoirs and dams used in training for the mission. Having been flown for much of her service with the BBMF as the "City of Lincoln", PA474 presently wears the markings of the "Phantom of the Ruhr", a Lancaster that flew 121 sorties. Just 3 of the original 133 crew are still alive: George Johnson, Les Munro and Frederick Sutherland. The map below shows part of the planned flight path to the dams.

Compared to today's pilots they flew incredibly low at 60ft to avoid detection. Given the lack of any sophisticated navigation aids it’s no wonder that at least one aircraft flew into power cables and another ditched in the sea. They also had to fly virtually the whole mission in the dark for the night-time raids and had to work out ways of maintaining exact height and distance from the dams so that the bombs hit the top of the dams and then dropped down, exploding by pressure fuse at what was assessed to be the weakest part of the dam.

If you have read your latest edition of Maplines, you will have noticed that the Historic Military Mapping Special Interest Group of the BCS is planning an autumn event that will tie in with the anniversary of the Dams raid. This will be a weekend in October based around a visit to the Lincolnshire Aviation Heritage Centre at East Kirkby airfield.This will include an opportunity to see their Lancaster, NX611"Just Jane", which is being refurbished with a view to making it airworthy again. At the moment it is only certified for tail-up taxi runs, sufficient speed to lift the tail wheel off the ground but no more.

Sixty years ago, on 29th May 1953, Sherpa Tenzing Norgay and Edmund Hillary became the first people to climb Everest. What has nowadays become a fairly regular occurrence; their feat was certainly ground breaking at the time, done without modern equipment, although they did have high altitude boots, rubber walkie-talkies and experimental oxygen tanks. May is traditionally one of the best times of the year to climb Everest, and this year has been one of the most crowded seasons with more than 500 people having scaled the mountain since the start of 2013.

Since the first successful climb, more than 4,500 people have reached the top. Amid the celebrations there are concerns about the growing number of climbers on Everest and the pollution they cause, so much so that Nepalese officials are now considering placing a limit on the number of climbers allowed to ascend Everest.

Interesting fact – the mountain as named after Colonel Sir George Everest, Surveyor-General of India from 1830 to 1843, whose name was pronounced Eve (as in the girl’s name) Rest, so by referring to it as Ev-e-rest we have been pronouncing it wrongly all these years!

This is one that I missed last month, but I wanted to include a slightly quirky map-related topic. Kenneth Ira Appel died on April 19 2013. If this is not a name that is immediately familiar, he was an American mathematician who in 1976, with colleague Wolfgang Haken solved one of the most famous problems in mathematics, the "Four Colour Theorem". They proved that any two-dimensional map, with certain limitations, can be filled in with four colours without any adjacent "countries" sharing the same colour. The proof has been one of the most controversial of modern mathematics because of its heavy dependence on computer "number-crunching" to sort through possibilities, which drew criticism from many in the mathematical community for its inelegance, including the comment "a good mathematical proof is like a poem—this is a telephone directory!”

The "map" on the left was designed to celebrate the 2013 Chelsea Flower Show. One hundred years ago, the RHS Chelsea Flower Show was held for the first time. Back in 1913 it was a three-day affair with 244 exhibitors, about half of them nurseries and a third sundriesmen (manufacturers of glasshouses, retailers of gardening tools and chemicals, stands for gardening magazines and makers of garden furniture). The remainder were a mixture of amateur gardeners, most representing the still-thriving world of country-house gardening, and professional garden designers. The RHS had held a Great Spring Show since 1862, but it moved to its current home and assumed the title in 1913. We haven’t yet hit the hundredth show as it was cancelled in 1917 and 1918 and for the whole of the Second World War.

Sundriesman is probably a word that is unfamiliar to most and is one of those professions that has become rare if not ceased to exist. In a recent article online entitled “Is Cartography Dead?”, the author speculated, "if “cartographer” is soon to be listed alongside “cooper” and “cartwright” in the tally of occupations of yesteryear?” Happily the author goes on to conclude that the answer to his question is “no”, full details at  http://blog.visual.ly/is-cartography-dead.

GeoDATA 2013 

The Society recently participated in the GeoDATA seminars in Birmingham and Sheffield and gave presentations on why cartography is still important, hopefully I helped to reinforce the message that cartography is still thriving. The talks went down well at both venues and encouraged a lot of questions at the stand afterwards. Both days were very busy and I signed up a number of new members at the events, four in Birmingham and five in Sheffield, so I'd like to say "Welcome!" to those receiving their first President’s monthly. The free to attend GeoDATA events continue during 2013 and BCS will have a presence at most, if not all, culminating in London in November. If you can help to man the stand in Edinburgh on 7th November or in Belfast on 21st November then please let me know.

Order at discount before end of June

And Finally 

The BCS 50th Anniversary Book is almost ready to go to press. We are offering this at a pre-publication price of £12.50 plus £2.50 P&P and have extended the deadline to 30th June. After this the book will be £15.00. See the website for full details.

Pete Jones MBE, CGeog, FRGS

PRESS RELEASE: BCS Symposium

Mapping Chiefs Unite to Discuss Future of Mapping at BCS Symposium

For what is thought to the first time ever, the heads of the five British Mapping and Charting agencies will come together to discuss the future of mapping in front of an audience of cartographic professionals and enthusiasts. This keynote presentation – ‘probably the most important conference session held in the UK, this year, on the future of mapping’ – acts as a headline for the British Cartographic Society’s 50th Annual Symposium. Part of a year-long celebration of mapmaking the theme of the anniversary Symposium is ‘Today, Tomorrow and Beyond’ reflecting the Society’s forward looking vision for the future of cartography, and the event is being held at the historic Hothorpe Hall, Leicestershire from 3-6 September 2013.

“In our 50^th Anniversary year it is a pleasure to return to Leicestershire as this was where the first Symposium was first held back in 1964,” commented Mr Peter Jones MBE, President of the British Cartographic Society. “It is also a huge honour to welcome senior executives from the five British Mapping and Charting agencies to discuss how their organisations have changed over the past fifty years and highlight what they see as the key elements of the future of mapping. This is the centrepiece of our Anniversary Symposium and emphasises how important maps are today in our rapidly changing and increasingly digital society.”

Dr Vanessa Lawrence CB, Director General and Chief Executive of the Ordnance Survey joins Paul Hancock, Director of the Defence Geographic Centre, John Wilkinson, Chief Executive Land and Property Services, Rear Admiral Ian Moncrieff, CBE, Chief Executive of United Kingdom Hydrographic Office and Professor John Ludden, Executive Director of the British Geological Survey for a session titled ‘The Future for the UK World Leaders in Mapping’.

The BCS Anniversary Symposium will follow the successful format of events developed over the past fifty years including formal presentations, hands on workshops and lively debates. The event kicks off with a number of Special Interest Group meetings, including the Map Curators, GIS and Design groups, followed by the biannual Helen Wallis Memorial Lecture. Nick Millea, Map Librarian at the Bodleian Library, University of Oxford will present ‘Today, tomorrow and beyond: can the past project cartography into the future?’ Other sessions during the three day event will include ‘Mapping technologies for tomorrow’, ‘Cartography and Geospatial Intelligence’ and ‘Mapping for the challenges of tomorrow’ with contributions from the Unites States Geospatial Intelligence Foundation, Glasgow School of Art and the British Antarctic Survey.

The 2013 BCS Annual Symposium is kindly sponsored by the Society’s corporate members Cadcorp, ESRI (UK), Harper Collins, Leica Geosystems, Newgrove, Ordnance Survey, Star-Apic, The GeoInformation Group and Victoria Litho and is organised on behalf of the Society by Training4GIS.

To find out more about this and other events in the 50th Anniversary Calendar follow the society on: twitter @bcsweb, facebook https://www.facebook.com/bcsweb or visit the webpage www.cartography.org.uk/symposium  

A booking form for the symposium can be downloaded: http://www.cartography.org.uk/downloads/mapping2013/Mapping2013.pdf

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Notes to editors

About the British Cartographic Society

The British Cartographic Society promotes the art and science of cartography through awards, events, publications and special interest groups. 2013 marks the 50^th Anniversary of the Society, a registered charity, and is being celebrated with a year-long programme of promotional, lecture, social and outreach events.  The 2013 calendar of events is sponsored by society corporate members Cadcorp, ESRI (UK), Harper Collins, Leica Geosystems, Newgrove, Star-Apic, The GeoInformation Group and Victoria Litho.

www.cartography.org.uk

BCS Presidents Report July/August

Dear Members

I thought it would be a good idea to have one report that covered both July and August as, unsurprisingly, we only have one event in August which is the Map Curators meeting in Leeds, 29-30 August. So Map Curators if you haven’t signed up already please do so.

On 13 July I was invited to the British Library for the launch of the Earth Platinum Atlas produced by Millennium House in Australia. It is the largest atlas in the world and just 31 copies will be produced. If you’d like to take a look (or buy one for $1000,000?) check out some images.

On 19 July there was a UK GEOForum meeting in London. The Forum has representatives from 14 associations/societies in geography and mapping industries and is an excellent group facilitating discussions of matters of the moment within the industry and co-operative ventures with organisations like the AGI, RGS and GA.

Indeed, there was a Better Mapping II event in London on 26 July which was organised in co-operation with the AGI and kindly hosted by our ‘initialsakes’, the British Computer Society. No problem with attendees, even just the day before the Olympic Opening Ceremony in London, with all 45 places filled. My thanks must go to our speakers: Peter Jones, Mary Spence, and Clare Seldon. Clare works for Steer Davies Gleave who are very supportive of these events – thank you too.

So after the Map Curators meeting at the end of August, we have a Council meeting on 6 September in London, and we hope to have a stand at the AGI Conference, 19-20 September at The East Midlands Conference Centre in Nottingham.

Then we have our first 2 day Restless Earth Schools Workshop in Penarth, 26-27 September. Looking further ahead still and to give you a ‘heads-up’, the GIS SIG will meet in London on 24 October at our ‘initialsakes’ offices and our AGM/Lecture/Dinner event will be at the RAF Club on 31 October starting at 1700.

Finally, on a personal note, some of you will be aware that I retired from Esri on 30 June after 15 years. I spent my first 5 years working for Esri UK and the remainder for Esri Inc in Redlands. You can’t be President of an organisation such as BCS without the full support of your employer and Esri in Redlands couldn’t have been more helpful. Closer to home, Esri UK are Corporate Members of BCS and sponsors of our Symposium so thank you too.

Let’s hope we have some more sunshine and we can all enjoy the August break.

Best Wishes

Peter Jolly
President of The British Cartographic Society

Guest Blog - Where Should I Go On Holiday Map

Thomson have just launched an interactive graphic which maps out European cities by their climate. They thought it might be of interest to The BCS and the readers of the BCS blog.

It allows users to define which month they would like to travel in, and a temperature and sunlight filter. The map displays places within these criteria along with other data when you hover over them. You can check out the post and the interactive graphic below.

Click image to open interactive version (via Thomson Holidays).

Additional blog page by BCS Cartographic Journal Editor Ken Field

Check it out for a free download of his award winning Beautiful Game Map
http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2011/10/beautiful-gameto-download.html