I love maps, and I'll admit that my wife and I have a bunch of map art hanging on our walls, one of each city or state where we've lived, but they're not like actual maps that you could fold up and take on a road trip. I hadn't thought of hanging up that sort of map. I'll also admit that I haven't bought a paper map to put in the glove box of my car in over a decade. I have printed Google Maps before a trip, though.

This is coming from a career Army officer, so I'm quite used to looking at maps on the walls of operations centers, and doing serious map-and-compass navigation exercises.

Where do you buy nice ones for the wall? I’ve wanted to do this but end up stumbling across random bespoke ones.

We've bought almost all of them through Etsy, and they are indeed "random bespoke" products. Some sellers are military spouses so they design prints of the places where we've lived (i.e. around Army bases, which wouldn't interest most other people). Last week we were looking at this one, and the seller appears to specialize in artistic maps: https://www.etsy.com/listing/346969594/fort-rucker-map-print...

Essentially retro-chic.

Some may have also discovered some utility in being able to have a big picture view of a destination. However, I wouldn't impute too much utility to the explanation. I'd be pretty surprised if younger generations are suddenly discovering that it can be really useful to have a physical backup in case their phone battery dies.

I agree with the big picture utility. A good project would be a map where you can choose to display all Best Westerns, Shell gas stations, etc at state zoom level so you can visualize a day's worth of travel including food, gas and lodging destinations without needing to repeatedly search GMaps. (i.e. it looks like there's a Shell station in 15, 65 and 128 miles along our route...)

This, and while no small device can easily replace a large physical map, but map developers aren't helping here either. I find more often then not, in map apps the 2nd you zoom out even a little, you start losing half the details. Even on a larger iPad. Especially the topo map apps, which also tend to forget most devices are HighDPI, so the topo image is also blurry.

I just wish I could set the map level to it's best, then zoom out as far as I want without jumping to a worse level map.

My physical backup in case my phone dies is my other older phone with offline maps installed. I wonder why more people don't do the same.

I only own one paper map, and it is specifically for art. I've traveled extensively and I wanted a way to track where I've been, so it's stapled to a pin-board, so I can put push-pins in after I visit somewhere. I've been primarily using a portable form of GPS for more than a decade, even before Google Maps.

Down the street from my office is a store that sells maps as art. Old maps, new maps, and transit memorabilia. One of the advantages of a digital map is that it always up to date, but that also means it can never be a historical document, the way an old map can be.

For myself I have a pile of bike maps, that I admit I don't use as much as I used to (partly because I have all my regular routes in my head now). The nice thing about those maps is that they marked elevation changes, and also the location of ice cream shops. You know, the essentials.

Ward Maps in Cambridge, MA?

yes.

I'm renting now, so I avoid putting things on the wall as much as possible. But I used to have a map to help build a mental map from repeatedly seeing it. Recently I've noticed that something similar happens to me with analogic watches.

>The article throws that in as a minor detail but I'd bet money it's the only reason.

For most people, perhaps.

After working in Google Geo, I drove across the country and back (CA - NC - TX - CA) using the trusty Rand & McNally atlas and compass, and couldn't have been happier.

No nagging voices telling me where to go. No countdown timers making me wary of taking a scenic detour. No feeling of going on rails.

Yes to seeing things and being aware of my environment. Yes to understanding where I am at all times. Yes to exercising my brain and being in control of my lived experience.

Yes to not becoming stupid [1][2][3][4].

But sure, maps are pretty too.

[1] https://www.vocativ.com/418342/google-maps-gps-navigation/in...

[2] https://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=5179471&page=1

[3] https://www.fieldandstream.com/blogs/a-sportsmans-life/gps-i...

[4] https://www.thedrive.com/news/8686/study-using-gps-navigatio...

It's a plausible hypothesis. I'd like to see data.

I love National Geographic maps of ancient places. They basically are maps as art.

As a hiker I find paper maps absolutely essential and far easier to use than anything digital. Maybe it's because of that familiarity that I print or buy paper maps whenever I'm going on a trip more than a few hours' drive from home. I also rely heavily on printed maps and guidebooks for any extended travel and for trip planning, which are excruciating if you're relying solely on the internet. Can't say I've ever used a map for art.

> and far easier to use than anything digital.

Paper maps are great for knowing where to go, but a little less great for knowing where you are. Off/deep trail hikers will have a stand-alone GPS, because climbing trees/hills to get your bearings ends up being a serious risk, with just a compass: https://gripped.com/gripped-outdoors/how-100-hikers-got-lost...

Entirely depends on the environment you're hiking in tbh.

True. Maps only work if there’s uniquely, unambiguously, identifiable terrain, that’s well understood from looking at the, necessarily, topographical map.

My favorites are the waterproof versions.