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Last broadcast on Wed, 24 Mar 2010, 15:45 on BBC Radio 4.
Synopsis
Self-confessed map addict Mike Parker explores modern cartography.
The ultimate in cheap and ubiquitous mapping, there's scarcely a vehicle in the land that doesn't contain a dog-eared road atlas. Road maps and their digital descendent, the sat nav, may guide us efficiently around our nation's highways but they don't tell us much else about the landscape we're speeding through. Mike recalls a bygone age of elegant motoring maps and considers how modern road mapping and its unrelenting emphasis on our motorways and trunk roads has changed our picture of Britain.
Motoring map from 1920
Here is a 1920 motorists' map of the west coast of Scotland produced by the Bartholomew company.
Where we are now
A Bartholomew advertisement for its maps from the 1930s.
National Library of Scotland
These maps have been reproduced with the kind permission of the National Library of Scotland.
Broadcast
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Wed 24 Mar 201015:45
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