Cartographies of Travel and Navigation

by James R. Akerman (Editor)

Overview

Finding one’s way with a map is a relatively recent phenomenon. In premodern times, maps were used, if at all, mainly for planning journeys in advance, not for guiding travelers on the road. With the exception of navigational sea charts, the use of maps by travelers only became common in the modern era; indeed, in the last two hundred years, maps have become the most ubiquitous and familiar genre of modern cartography.

Examining the historical relationship between travelers, navigation, and maps, Cartographies of Travel and Navigation considers the cartographic response to the new modalities of modern travel brought about by technological and institutional developments in the twentieth century. Highlighting the ways in which the travelers, operators, and planners of modern transportation systems value maps as both navigation tools and as representatives of a radical new mobility, this collection brings the cartography of travel—by road, sea, rail, and air—to the forefront, placing maps at the center of the history of travel and movement.

Richly and colorfully illustrated, Cartographies of Travel and Navigation ably fills the void in historical literature on transportation mapping.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780226010748
Publisher:	University of Chicago Press
Publication date:	10/01/2006
Series:	The Kenneth Nebenzahl Jr. Lectures in the History of Cartography
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	344
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 1.20(d)

About the Author

James R. Akerman is curator of maps at the Newberry Library, and director of the library’s Hermon Dunlap Smith Center for the History of Cartography.

Read an Excerpt

CARTOGRAPHIES OF TRAVEL AND NAVIGATION
THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO PRESS Copyright © 2006 The University of Chicago
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-226-01074-8



Chapter One Introduction

JAMES R. AKERMAN

Wayfinding is popularly thought to be among the primary uses of a map. But the historical record shows that, with perhaps the major exception of navigational sea charts, the use of maps by travelers for wayfinding only became common in the modern era. Catherine Delano-Smith writes in her contribution to this volume that "the paradox is that what today constitutes by far the commonest use of the commonest types of maps ... is the one purpose for which maps were not used in pre-modern times." To be sure, we may point to a few scattered ancient examples of what have traditionally been considered road maps-the so-called Peutinger Table, for instance, which shows the major routes of the later Roman world, or Matthew Paris's thirteenth-century itinerary-style map of the route from London to The Holy Land. But as late as the dawn of the nineteenth century, Delano-Smith observes, maps were used mostly for planning journeys in advance, not for guiding travelers on the road. Sea charts emerged in the Mediterranean somewhat earlier, by the thirteenth century, but scholars are still debating the extent to which these early portolan charts, represent a developed tradition of on-board ship use. Andrew Cook shows in his contribution to this book that late eighteenth-century sailors largely relied on simple instruments and their own knowledge of currents and winds to navigate the open ocean. By way of contrast, written travel directions-or itineraries-for use on land or sea date at least from Roman times, and were the preferred form for communicating navigational information on land well into the modern era.

It is an open question even today whether automobile travelers need, much less prefer, to consult road maps on most journeys. The signage and insularity of modern superhighways have made it possible for American motorists to travel capably across the continent without the benefit of a map. The present push to develop the digital in-car navigation systems described here by Robert French-some of which rely on verbal navigational commands-suggests that a substantial number of motorists would prefer to do without maps altogether, or at least without a concentrated reading of them. Passive train travelers have little navigational need for maps; modern air passengers still less.

Yet, the simple fact remains that travelers' maps were among the most widely distributed of all map forms during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, because as in the early modern past, their function extends far beyond simple navigation. Gerald Musich documents a broad array of railroad maps developed during the nineteenth century, in the first instance to help railroads and their customers conceptualize and operate in the railroad environment, and, in the second instance, to sell railroads to investors, shippers, and passengers. In my contribution I argue that American automobile road maps of the twentieth century similarly transcended their simple navigational requirements to promote and to provide meaning to the motoring experience. Yet, Ralph Ehrenberg's chronicle of the search by early air pilots for map formats suitable to the new experience of navigating in heavier-than-air craft reminds us that each modern form of transport presented new navigational challenges, but also new opportunities, that required new cartographies. We might summarize this volume as a contemplation of the cartographic response to the widening geographic range and the new modalities of modern travel brought about by the technological and institutional transformations of the age.

A number of considerations help us to characterize the level and nature of map use by travelers, including the role of the traveler in navigation, and the nature, speed, and range of the conveyance involved. The six chapters that follow highlight the different requirements of wayfinding maps that inevitably arise as the traveler moves from the sea, to roads and rails, and to the air. Tacitly-but more explicitly, in the case of Delano-Smith's chapter-they also ponder the sudden appearance and extensive reliance on travel and navigational maps during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Did modern transportation technologies fundamentally change the needs of travelers? Or was it-has it always been-that maps depicting paths of movement served other purposes than wayfinding? Indeed, what does it mean to use a map to navigate?

Mapping and Navigation

As a technical term, "navigation" generally refers to the act of operating, steering, or guiding a vehicle or vessel from one place to another. Historically, navigation referred to the operation of marine vessels, but, particularly since the advent of the airplane, it has come to refer to the direction and operation of other means of transportation as well. We should note that additional meanings refer more broadly to the act of traversing from place to place or operating a vehicle, or to ship traffic and commerce. For our purposes, "navigation" is roughly synonymous with wayfinding-that is, the successful movement of a vehicle or one's person from one geographical location to another, be it over predetermined routes or routes of the navigator's choosing.

It follows that maps for navigation or wayfinding are those that assist movement along some route. By this definition, any map that gives the relative location of two or more places-that is, virtually any map-could be called a navigational map, but common sense limits us to maps produced and designed primarily to assist navigation. Even this narrowing of the field allows for a broad range of map types and levels of specificity. To simplify matters we may group all navigational, or wayfinding, maps into two broad categories-network maps, and route-specific maps-recognizing that these are ideal types that are frequently hybridized and combined within specific publications.

Network maps tend to be smaller in scale and concerned with depicting an entire system of routes and pathways (see, e.g., figures 4.14 and 5.12). Most modern road and railroad maps fall into this category, as do smaller scale aeronautical and sea charts. Depending on the situation, such maps may be used only for planning a route in advance of an actual trip, or also to verify and correct the course of travel during the journey. A motorist may use a map to plan a pleasure trip months in advance, thus navigating the terrain in her imagination. Encountering an unforeseen obstacle while on the road, she may refer to the map again to choose an alternate route.

Route-specific maps tend to be larger in scale, and as the name implies, are concerned with the navigation of specific routes or pathways. Strip road maps, for instance, or charts showing specific seaways and inland waterways, tend to be deployed when specific hazards, landmarks, decision points (such as crossroads), topography, and cultural features warrant a traveler's close attention. This class of navigational map is the closest descendent of the verbal itinerary or sailing direction, which literally narrate a route, or instruct a traveler how to get from place to place in relation to local obstacles and landmarks.

Though we might associate verbal navigational guides most readily with the premodern itineraries discussed in this volume by Catherine Delano-Smith, or with sailing directions (portolani, rutters), verbal navigation remains a part of modern publications and products such as railroad timetables, published automobile route logs, and most forms of digital in-car navigation systems. Even aeronautical navigation relies to a considerable extent on the oral instructions transmitted by air traffic controllers advising pilots to adopt specific bearings or altitudes at strategic points along their routes. (On some flights it is now possible for passengers to listen in on these communications.)

Route-specific maps are most useful when navigation requires the careful attention of the traveler or vehicle operator. Network maps, on the other hand, have the advantage of providing the traveler with the general geographical context of his chosen route and how it stands in relation to other routes and geographical features some distance away. The relative strengths of the two ideal types have remained unchanged over time and have consequently engaged in a tug-of-war through the recent history of travel mapping. Andrew Cook proposes a typology of sea charts that range from small-scale general charts used for route planning, to charts designed to show specific tracks. Railroad maps range from the large-scale strip maps and atlases of single rail lines prepared for railroad operators (see figure 4.7), to small scale maps intended to show the rail network of an entire continent. Between these two extremes are American railroad maps that have elements of both ideal types. They show the rudiments of the national rail network, but, in the manner of railroad timetables, they emphasize the sequence of stops along a single line, and seem to arrange all surrounding geography, including connecting rail lines, in relation to that sequence of stops (see 4.17). Road maps in strip and network format coexisted in eighteenth-century Britain (see figures 2.16 and 2.18). Many early American automobile road maps simply showed a single route in strip format (see figure 5.2). Early motor clubs issued cards with maps or lists describing individual routes; later, the AAA developed custom-made atlases of route-specific maps called Triptiks to depict an itinerary specified by motor club members. Early aeronautical mapping experimented with both types as well (see figures 6.6 and 6.13).

Map characteristics and design also reflect differences in the identity of the navigator. The title of this volume signals the fact that in many contexts, wayfinding is only secondary to the other uses made of travel maps. Such maps serve as descriptive guides, souvenirs, and promotional publications intended for travelers who have nothing to do with the pilotage or operation of the vehicle they ride.

I have used the terms "traveler" and "navigator" interchangeably to this point, but we should be clear about what is implied by these two terms. Most navigators are travelers, since the navigation of a vehicle for some distance-historically, at least-requires that the navigator travel with the vehicle. All travelers, on the other hand, do not seem to be navigators. Premodern travelers mostly moved on foot or on beasts, whose rate and direction of movement they controlled. In a broad sense, then, they were navigators as well as travelers. Modern automobile travelers include drivers, who are navigators as well, and their passengers, who may assist in the navigation of the vehicle by reading maps and shouting directions such as "turn here" or "you missed your exit." As a consequence, the maps and guides used by motorists generally must provide a relatively large amount of navigational detail. My essay argues that this was particularly true in the early automobile era, but Robert French shows that it was no less true at the end of the twentieth century. Improvements in route marking during the 1920s lessened the navigational burden of road map design but did not eliminate it altogether. In contrast, under normal circumstances, modern commercial air, rail, and sea passengers play no role in navigating the planes, trains, and boats they ride, and the maps designed for them will differ significantly from the maps used by the pilots, engineers, and captains who travel with them. Maps made for nineteenth-century American railroad passengers, as Gerald Musich notes, thus often provided only minimal navigational details, being essentially promotional documents.

That said, all travel maps retain a navigational component, because all travelers must navigate themselves, at the very least, on and off the vehicles of their choosing. A rail traveler wishing to journey from New York to San Francisco is not called upon to navigate the vehicle in a traditional sense, but he is required to sort out the possibilities: Should he travel via Pittsburgh, St. Louis, and Denver, or take a more northerly route via Buffalo, Chicago, and Salt Lake City? Does he wish to stop for a few days somewhere along the route to rest or to visit a national park? These decisions are navigational decisions. Modern travelers may not always determine the pathways they follow, but they do determine which pathways they follow. Network and route-specific maps persist alongside each other because travelers, to one degree or another, still need both to plan and to execute their itineraries. Thus, with regard to travelers' maps, navigation embraces route planning, route promotion, as well as pilotage itself.

The Rise of Travel Mapping

The rise of transportation cartography in the decades before and after 1800 had much to do with factors that were then generic to the general expansion and diversification of map publishing. The application of lithography, steel engraving, cerography, and photolithography to cartography greatly simplified and reduced the cost of making maps. The rise of modern consumerism increased the demand for maps as material goods and stimulated the growth of new economic sectors that either encouraged or demanded map use. The growth of public education and rising literacy rates fostered a corresponding growth in map literacy and interest in geographical topics. Hence, we find a general expansion in the production and use of school geographies, wall maps, and atlases throughout Europe and North America. Likewise, periodicals and newspapers increased their use of maps, along with other forms of illustration, as literacy rates expanded and developments in printing technology eased the reproduction of simple graphics. Over the course of the eighteenth century in Britain, we may also point to a significant rise in the opportunity and inclination to travel displayed by the emerging upper middle class and the aristocracy, which fostered the growth of modern tourism, both domestic and foreign, accounting for a significant upturn in the demand for travel guides of all sorts, including portable practical road atlases and maps.

But, most fundamentally, the emergence of the travel cartography may be seen as a culminating effect of the transformation of travel technology itself. In his survey of the historical geography of modern transportation, James Vance has argued that Europeans underwent a transportation revolution from roughly 1500-1800. Advances in engineering and renewed dedication to bridge and canal building and wagon construction greatly improved inland movement just as the Great Discoveries quickened interest in travel and the movement of goods overseas. The mercantilist political philosophy of most European governments fostered the general growth of trade by investing in infrastructure and lifting or streamlining the legal impediments to travel.

Though these transformations brought about a significant expansion of European horizons-itself marked by the wider circulation of maps of all sorts-it was a second, vehicular revolution (in Vance's words), which brought about the proliferation of specialized travel cartography. The emergence of artificially powered movement in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth-centuries greatly increased both the range and speed of transportation, requiring travelers and vehicle operators to absorb geographic information more quickly and over a broader area. Single-minded in their description of individual principal routes of travel, itineraries were poorly suited to the continental-sized spaces that trains and cars could traverse in days and airplanes in hours. General reference maps could be adapted for use by travelers, and often were, but they were poorly suited to the description of complex route choices made available during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

(Continues...)

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Table of Contents

Preface and Acknowledgements
 

Chapter 1.  Introduction

James R. Akerman

Chapter 2.  Milieus of Mobility: Itineraries, Route Maps, and Road Maps

Catherine Delano-Smith

Chapter 3.  Surveying the Seas: Establishing the Sea Routes to the East Indies

Andrew S. Cook

Chapter 4.  Mapping a Transcontinental Nation: Nineteenth- and Early Twentieth-Century American Rail Travel Cartography

Jerry Musich

Chapter 5.  Twentieth-Century American Road Maps and the Making of a National Motorized Space

James R. Akerman

Chapter 6.  “Up in the Air in More Ways Than One”: The Emergence of Aeronautical Charts in the United States

Ralph E. Ehrenberg

Chapter 7.  Maps on Wheels: The Evolution of Intelligent Automobile Navigation          

Robert L. French
 

Notes

List of Contributors

Index