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Thread: Someone told me the UK is drawn out of scale in world/europe maps, to appear bigger

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    Gold Member Marcos's Avatar
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    Someone told me the UK is drawn out of scale in world/europe maps, to appear bigger

    Could this be at all true??

    Maybe in old maps? To make the UK seem more powerful back in the day? Well, hopefully not...




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    lazy student nvening's Avatar
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    Re: Someone told me the UK is drawn out of scale in world/europe maps, to appear bigg

    see ive always thought that - but that view is supposively a photo from a sat so it must be accurate :s
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    Hexus.Jet TeePee's Avatar
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    Re: Someone told me the UK is drawn out of scale in world/europe maps, to appear bigg

    Sort of.

    The classic map of the world is the Mercator(sp) projection. Basically the northern hemisphere (being most important) occupies the upper two thirds of the map. Anything away from the equator is stretched in size to translate the sphere into a flat map.

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    Re: Someone told me the UK is drawn out of scale in world/europe maps, to appear bigg

    The shape and size of the UK does actually fluctuate quite a lot from map to map.

    It depends on who's drawing it, or whether it's a photo:

    http://noisydecentgraphics.typepad.c...snt-engla.html

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    lazy student nvening's Avatar
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    Re: Someone told me the UK is drawn out of scale in world/europe maps, to appear bigg

    thats quite an intresting article, cheers
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    Re: Someone told me the UK is drawn out of scale in world/europe maps, to appear bigg

    Oh it's been such a long time since GCSE geography...

    Those are some pretty big differences in the shape of the British Isles, some of those outlines look like bad doodles...

    Ignoring polictical reasons behind expanding your country, map projections vary quite a bit due to the different methods of maintaining shapes and distances, and some will completely forgoe accuracy of one for the sake of the other. There were two projections used to demonstrate the extremes of this but the names escape me. Atlas and map posters usually have the name of the projection used printed on them.

    The result is that if you took a piece of string and held it between two points on a globe, you won't get the same line if you did it with a flat map, and that line on the map will vary by projection.

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    Re: Someone told me the UK is drawn out of scale in world/europe maps, to appear bigg

    Actually, its none of the above explanations.

    The reason for the UK changing in size on maps actually depends on when the map was drawn and the state of the UK financially at that time.

    eg : Back when the British Empire was at its strongest, and half the worlds were its slaves, then the UK itself was massive, its landmass displacing so much water that all the other countries were then flooded around the edges, making them smaller.

    Of course, in our current climate, the edges of the UK have been receding, displacing far less water, and allowing the rest of the world some of their land mass back, which in turn makes them look a lot bigger in comparison to us.

    Experts reckon that if we carry on in this downward trend, we will all be standing on Ben Nevis trying to keep our feet dry, and the only thing visible on a map will be a small pointy bit resembling Gordon Browns head.
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    Senior Member JPreston's Avatar
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    Re: Someone told me the UK is drawn out of scale in world/europe maps, to appear bigg

    Quote Originally Posted by TeePee View Post
    Sort of.

    The classic map of the world is the Mercator(sp) projection. Basically the northern hemisphere (being most important) occupies the upper two thirds of the map. Anything away from the equator is stretched in size to translate the sphere into a flat map.
    This is right. It's not a fiendish imperial conspiracy seeking to exagerate Britain's land mass by a few percent so the French think 'Ooh, better not mess with them, they're ever so slightly larger than we thought', but rather a combination of wanting to show reasonable detail of the significant countries (different blocs use different projections as they are more relevant, eg China uses a China-centric one) and the problem of having to represent the surface of a sphere on a flat page.
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    Re: Someone told me the UK is drawn out of scale in world/europe maps, to appear bigg

    You guys may find this interesting if you haven't heard of it before: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dymaxion_map

    Theres more info about the map and map distortion in general in Buckminster Fuller's 'Critical Path', which I posted about in the favourite books thread the other day funnily enough!

    Is it possible to have a favourite map? 'Cause the Dymaxion is mine.
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    Re: Someone told me the UK is drawn out of scale in world/europe maps, to appear bigg

    I was told about the UK being bigger on maps years ago but didn't really look into it.

    Nice thread mind, loving the Fuller map also Funke.
    h e l l p a s o

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    ho! ho! ho! mofo santa claus's Avatar
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    Re: Someone told me the UK is drawn out of scale in world/europe maps, to appear bigg


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    Re: Someone told me the UK is drawn out of scale in world/europe maps, to appear bigg

    Ashas been said, a lot depends on the map projection. For maritime navigation, the Mercator projection is used because lines for navigation segments appear as straight lines. The scale (for maritime charts) is 1 minute of latitude is equal to 1 nautical mile, but the scale varies with latitude because of the projection. At the poles the scale becomes infinite, and for polar navigation a different projection is used.

    Britain has a strong seafaring trdition and the mercator projection is a familiar one. Because Britain lies roughly 52 degrees Noirth of the equator, its apparant size is enlarged - Greenland, being further North appears even larger in scale as it lies further north. The same effect is seen in southern latitudes.

    Traditionally maps are drawn North up, and is considered bt some to be representative of a nothern dominant culture. There are mapos drawn with a south up perspective which are supposed to redress the inequality - but this is now straying into geo-political territory!
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    Now with added sobriety Rave's Avatar
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    Re: Someone told me the UK is drawn out of scale in world/europe maps, to appear bigg

    Quote Originally Posted by santa claus View Post
    Thanks. Seeing that projection in 2nd year Geography opened my eyes. TBH though, there's nothing better than owning an accurate globe. I had one years ago and lost it, I still want another.

    With a proper globe, you'll undertand a lot of stuff. New York is west of London. West of London is the Bristol Channel. But Pan Am 103 blew up over Lockerbie in Scotland. Put a bit of string over a globe and you'll see why.

    I wondered why my flight from Geneva (Switzerland) to Kansai (Japan) overflew the far north of siberia and had to swerve round North Korea. Again put a string on a globe and it makes perfect sense.

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    Re: Someone told me the UK is drawn out of scale in world/europe maps, to appear bigg

    Great Circles - where the shortest distance between two places on the Earth is a curve. Looks odd, but when you look into it, it actually a makes a lot of sense. However, there are also other considerations with air travel such as air corriders.

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