A New Era in AT Topo Maps

[postholer.com]

Finally, a topographic map set worthy of the Appalachian Trail.

These are not scanned 20-50 year old topos maps.

Here are the details including a preview of all New Hampshire:
http://postholer.com/ATMaps

The 3 volume Appalachian Trail Map series is created digitally using the most current landcover, hydrology, elevation, etc, data available. Most of the data is less than 6 years old.

Along with absolute clarity, seamless digitized maps mean uniformity in color, style, fonts, textures and unit of measure from Georgia to Maine.

Features:
+ 349 full color, digitized topographic maps
+ Beautiful 3D hill shading
+ Useful, highly detailed elevation chart on each map
+ Divided into 23 sections with section overview maps
+ 6" x 9" (15.2cm x 22.9cm) format for easy pack stowage
+ Accumulated trail mileage every mile
+ Resupply locations within 90 miles of map center
+ 1:40,000 scale with WGS84 decimal degree tick marks
+ 7 landcover types, evergreen, deciduous, mixed, shrub, bare, moderate/heavy urban
+ Trail trace, parking and shelter data from AppalachianTrail.org
+ Over 850 shelter, parking and resupply locations
+ Partial proceeds donated to the Appalachian Trail Conservancy

These maps and elevation profiles cost less than half of the traditional map set, yet embody the latest technology and data available.

K. Scott Parks, aka, postholer
[email protected]

[T.S.Kobzol]

What is trade paper? Are they waterproof?

Sent from my GT-N7000 using Tapatalk 2

[rocketsocks]

I like it.Not necessary for hiking the trail,lot of detail,but a nice collection of maps.What does it weigh?per book

[postholer.com]

Each book weighs about 7oz. If you were inclined to carry them, you need to only carry one at a time.

The paper is a bright white bond, very good quality. It's not waterproof, but it would hold up well in dampness. Even if creating a bound book with waterproof paper was an option, the cost would be prohibitive. Think ziplock!

I think folks will really like these, on or off the trail. Planning or hiking they really stand out.

-postholer

[rocketsocks]

Oh yeah 7oz, they'll sale.thanks

[ki0eh]

Wondering about the 1:40,000 scale, is this for the day hiker more than the thru? Or does it vary by locale, maybe the Whites on a larger scale than, say, the middle of PA or VA?

[Mags]

Surprised no one has done their own AT maps yet until now. They have them for the CDT, PCT and other trails (GDT, Heyduke and so on). One map for 1/3rd of the trail would make logistics super easy, too...

[gearfreak]

Surprised no one has done their own AT maps yet until now. They have them for the CDT, PCT and other trails (GDT, Heyduke and so on). One map for 1/3rd of the trail would make logistics super easy, too...

I'm very surprised at this as well. These maps were advertised on this site for over a year. The waypoints on these maps are much more relevant as they are tied to the official mileage in the trail guides and they reflect dependable water sources. I do wish postholer success with his endeavor, a tremendous amount of work goes into these types of projects.

[Mags]

I'm very surprised at this as well. These maps were advertised on this site for over a year. The waypoints on these maps are much more relevant as they are tied to the official mileage in the trail guides and they reflect dependable water sources. I do wish postholer success with his endeavor, a tremendous amount of work goes into these types of projects.

Poor advertisement and promotion then. I'm reasonably active and that is the first I've heard of them.

[postholer.com]

The Postholer AT Maps are created with data that is very recent. The landcover data used was simply not available prior to Feb. 2011.

Further, an enormous, gigantic hurdle had to be overcome before these maps could be realized. While I won't say what that was, it took over 2 months to address that single issue. Overcoming that made it possible for a complete, digitally created map set.

The postholer AT maps simply weren't possible until very recently, that is why I stress don't compare them to any map set created the 20-50 old scanned maps. That's not a slam, it's just a progression in technology. My hat's off to anyone who has walked this path!

Map scale. A 1:40K map scale is a great compromise between detail and coverage. While retaining detail, you get good coverage in a smaller package which is a huge concern when lugging 1:24K maps around. The maps have 200/40 major/minor contours just like the 1:24K maps do with excellent detail.

-postholer

[Feral Bill]

I'm drooling over these.

[ki0eh]

Map scale is a real balancing act, right here I have one of the newer Keystone Trails Association (KTA) A.T. maps, current color generation (not the vague dots on muddy old topo repro what Bill Bryson famously swore at), and its scale is 1:63,360. So I would have thought that 1:40k would be more detail than the average thru would be interested in, but you can lose a lot in 100' contour interval though.

Regenerating the basemap is more difficult than it sometimes seems as well. It appears road name information is missing, I admit that's always tough to get. What is the source of elevation information for the profiles?

[WingedMonkey]

Poor advertisement and promotion then. I'm reasonably active and that is the first I've heard of them.

Maybe I misunderstood, are you saying that AT-Topo was using poor advertising in his purchase of banner adds on Whiteblaze. Is there a better way of promotion?

[Mags]

Maybe I misunderstood, are you saying that AT-Topo was using poor advertising in his purchase of banner adds on Whiteblaze. Is there a better way of promotion?

Many people use ad blocker software and may have missed it. If it has been out a year and is not widely known it seems.

Purchasing ads can help, but it has its limitations. So yes, there are better ways of promoting. Just saying...

Not looking to thread jack, so if you'd like to discuss this further please PM me and/or start a new thread.

[postholer.com]

On the AT map page click the 'Read exhaustive details' link or just go here for all the gory details on data sources and map creation. The info is PCT map book centric, but still applies.

Ironically, creating the base maps is a no brainer. Getting the data ducks in a row is the tedious part. The map creation process 'follows' the trail trace and 36 hours later of computer crunching it spits out all 349 maps as you see them. As data changes it's just a matter of swapping data and re-running the process. I can't tell you how painless map updates are!

-postholer

[Odd Man Out]

I have a question. for those parts of the trail that don't run mostly north and south, would it be possible to orient the map so each page gets as much of the trail as possible on the long dimension of the page, even if it means that up is not north. This would allow you to get more of the trail on each map and also allow you to have fewer pages to cover the whole trail (both pluses, I think). The downside is that we are so used to having up be north, it could be confusing. But it seems that digital cartography is getting us away from that. I know that GPS navigation systems in cars orient the display so that up on the screen is the direction you are driving. If you are used to "up is always north", it takes a little getting use to, but after a while it works just as well. Of course you would have a compass rose on the map and presumably travel with a compass, so it should till work. Any thoughts on that?

[ki0eh]

The thought of auto-generating tiles is quite impressive! I guess you would have to stick to those tile bounds for updates and not auto-generate again, one would hope that the A.T. is able to be accommodated within static tile bounds at this point. It looks from your sample you have corridor land data as well, that doesn't seem an easy thing to chase down for the entire A.T., knowing how much of a pain in the neck it is to get conforming data from each of the land managing agencies in PA.

I think 1 arc second NED at some level still often defaults to "bored grad student years ago digitizing an analog topo from 1946," but I would also imagine such a setup would be able to accommodate LiDAR-based data when it's more commonly available.

Road names and classifications in the East is a bear, maybe TIGER files for the next census will go further into classification, and I can understand not paying the NAVTEQ/Tele Atlas/Google who underlay the automotive GPS, as in the mountains they often get it wrong anyway.

[Rain Man]

How is it that this,-- besides being in the wrong forum (correctly would be in "Media" (maps)),-- isn't in violation of the User Agreement, which says "6. No commercial posts are allowed...."

Am I missing two or three things?

Rain Man

.

[postholer.com]

...for those parts of the trail that don't run mostly north and south, would it be possible to orient the map so each page gets as much of the trail as possible on the long dimension of the page, even if it means that up is not north.

That is by far the most optimized way, converting between portrait and landscape. Early on that is what I did. However, I often found myself not making the mental adjustment and that was without any pressure. For the sake of the hiker on the trail, under pressure, in the time of need, I left them all oriented the same way. It would use less paper, be cheaper and generally more efficicent to mix and match surely. Weighing all that, I opted for utter simplicity.

...I guess you would have to stick to those tile bounds for updates and not auto-generate again, one would hope that the A.T. is able to be accommodated within static tile bounds at this point.

Specifying the scale, paper size, margins and dpi in the configuration dictates the resulting tiles. Change those values and rerun. If data is required outside of those bounds, just download from one of the above mentioned sources. Painless!

It's impressive the NED data you can get. 1/9 arc sec is available if you want to get the contour of the hood of your car!

-postholer

[Feral Bill]

How is it that this,-- besides being in the wrong forum (correctly would be in "Media" (maps)),-- isn't in violation of the User Agreement, which says "6. No commercial posts are allowed...."

Am I missing two or three things?

Rain Man

.

Perhps we need as "Shameless Commerce" forum for commercial items of legitimate interest to WB. For a small posting fee, of course.