One Hour on the Irish Border

One of the major considerations in the Brexit negotiations between the EU and the UK is the border between the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. This is the only land border between the UK and the EU. When free movement and free trade between the EU and the UK ends there may need to be a return to a hard border between Northern Ireland and the Republic.

The Guardian newspaper has created an animated map which shows the traffic crossing the border at 10 different locations during one hour on Monday 2nd, September 2019. A Typical Hour in the Life of the Irish Border uses data from under-wheel sensors at ten different locations on the border. The animated map helps to visualize the amount of traffic between the two countries. Traffic and trade which is likely to be seriously disrupted and slowed if a hard border is reintroduced between the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland.


The 1998 Belfast Agreement ended the Troubles in Northern Ireland and removed the hard border. The worry is that a return to a hard border would destabilize the Belfast Agreement and could even reignite anger and violence. If anyone is in any doubt about the level of violence experienced along the old hard border between the Republic and Northern Ireland they should check out the Irish Times' Explore the Border interactive map.

Explore the Border maps a sample of just some of the border incidents experienced during the Troubles. Click on a marker on the map and you are taken to one of the old crossings along the border. The map sidebar reports on any major violent incidents which occurred at this crossing. The number of bombings, shootings and arson attacks are also listed.

Explore the Border also uses Google Street View images of each mapped crossing on the border. This allows you to explore the border for yourself and highlights how a hard border would not only be difficult to implement but would be an ugly scar on a very beautiful country


Keith O’Faoláin has created an animated movie of the Irish border, Oh Border Where Art Thou. The movie uses satellite imagery to explore the border between the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland.

Watching the movie it is very apparent that the current border is very 'soft'. There are very few hard geographical barriers between the Republic and Northern Ireland. Mostly the border just follows roads and fields. If a hard border does have to be created it will prove very expensive and we will probably have to ask Mexico to pay for it.

Do You Speak the Queen's English?

The most popular interactive page on the New York Times website in 2013 was How Y’all, Youse and You Guys Talk. This interactive feature asked readers to answer questions about the words they use and how they pronounce them. From the answers given to these language questions the NYT was able to create an interactive map showing where the reader was from in the United States.

Now the New York Times has released a similar interactive feature which can tell Irish and British readers where they are from. If you answer 25 questions about the words you use and how you say them then the NYT will create a heat map identifying where it thinks you were raised. The newspaper will also show you a heat map after every single question you answer showing you where your answer is most and least common.

The British-Irish Dialect Quiz just about managed to identify where I was raised (pictured in the map above). I grew-up just within the southern tip of the NYT's heat map generated from my answers. However I have spent most of my adult life in London which could be why it thinks I'm from a little further north. than my childhood home.

The Irish Border - the Movie

Yesterday I posted a short tutorial on creating animated movies using aerial imagery from Google Maps. Today someone was kind enough to direct me towards Keith O’Faoláin's animated movie of the Irish border, Oh Border Where Art Thou.

One result of the UK's exit from the European Union could be the reintroduction of a hard border between the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. Oh Border Where Art Thou is a great visualization of how difficult this task would be. The animated movie scrolls along the current border using Google Maps aerial imagery.

Watching the movie it is very apparent that the current border is very 'soft'. There are very few hard geographical barriers between the Republic and Northern Ireland. Mostly the border just follows roads and fields. If a hard border does have to be created it will prove very expensive and we will probably have to ask Mexico to pay for it.

You can explore the border further on the Irish Times' Explore the Border. This interactive map highlights some of the violent border incidents which occurred during the Troubles. The map also shows Google Street View images of each mapped crossing on the border. This allows you to explore the border for yourself and highlights how a hard border would not only be difficult to implement but would be quite an ugly scar on what is a very beautiful country.

Brexit & the Irish Border

One of the major considerations in the Brexit negotiations between the EU and the UK is the border between the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. This is the only land border between the UK and the EU. When free movement and free trade between the EU and the UK ends there may need to be a return to a hard border between Northern Ireland and the Republic.

The 1998 Belfast Agreement ended the Troubles in Northern Ireland and removed the hard border. The worry is that a return to a hard border would destabilize the Belfast Agreement and could even reignite anger and violence. If anyone is in any doubt about the level of violence experienced along the old hard border between the Republic and Northern Ireland they should check out the Irish Times' Explore the Border interactive map.

Explore the Border maps a sample of just some of the border incidents experienced during the Troubles. Click on a marker on the map and you are taken to one of the old crossings along the border. The map sidebar reports on any major violent incidents which occurred at this crossing. The number of bombings, shootings and arson attacks are also listed.

Explore the Border also shows Google Street View images of each mapped crossing on the border. This allows you to explore the border for yourself and highlights how a hard border would not only be difficult to implement but would be an ugly scar on a very beautiful country.

Cork in 3D

Cork Guide has released a mapped guide to Ireland's third largest city. This bird's eye view interactive map provides an interesting categorized guide to the city and its major points of interest, hotels & heritage bars.

At the heart of the Cork Guide is an oblique map of the city showing the city's buildings in 3D. The 3D map is a little bit of a cheat as an interactive 3D map as it is built on an image map rather than from vector map tiles. Using a static image of the city as the map means that more details on the buildings aren't revealed as you zoom in on the map. As the map image of the city doesn't have any map labels it also means that there aren't any road names displayed on the map, even at the highest zoom levels.

However the map is still interactive and you can click on areas of the city to discover more about Cork, its history and places to visit in the city. The map information windows also include links to OpenStreetMap, which means that if you decide to visit somewhere you discover on the map you can get the address details (and road names) you need from OSM.

The main advantage of the image map library developed for the city guide is that it can also be used for building plans. If you click on the Cork Public Museum link you can view the library has been used to create a floor map for the museum. Again an oblique bird's eye view is used, this time showing a roofless plan of the museum. Click on the individual rooms in the museum plan and you can find out more about what you will find in that exhibition space. This is a much better use of the Cork Guide static image mapping library.

If I was developing the Cork Guide going forward I would restrict the use of the static image map library for creating interactive building plans for major buildings in the city. I would then look to replace the main mapped guide to the city using an established 3D mapping platform such as OSM Buildings.

How far can you travel on a Dublin bus?

Dublin is currently planning a major overhaul of its bus network. This will involve a more efficient network which connects more locations and which will carry more passengers. Of course the new network also carries the danger of upsetting existing customers, who are familiar with the current routes and services.

What better way to show the benefits of the new Dublin bus network than with an isochone travel time map? This map shows how far you can travel in 30 minutes using the current bus routes and how far you will be able to travel using the new proposed BusConnects routes. Enter a location into the Dublin's Proposed New Bus Network interactive map and you can see two isochrone overlays. One showing how far you could travel using the old routes and the other visualizing how far you can travel in 30 minutes using the new routes.

The isochrone layers are calculated based on how far you could travel assuming bus, rail and tram frequencies between 9:00 AM and 3:00 PM on weekdays. The calculated travel times include the walking, waiting and time on public transport. The waiting time is given as half the time between scheduled buses. For example, if a bus comes every 20 minutes the waiting time is calculated as 10 minutes.

As well as knowing how much further you can travel in 30 minutes using the new BusConnects network customers will also need to know where the new routes go. Therefore the Dublin's Proposed New Bus Network interactive map also shows all the new proposed bus routes. If you hover a route on the map you can view the bus frequency (how often buses will run on that route).

4,000 Irish Shipwrecks

The Wreck Viewer is a new interactive map which shows the locations of 4,000 shipwrecks around the shores of Ireland, dating back as far as the 16th century. The map was created by Ireland's National Monuments Service (NMS) to help provide access to and visualize the NMS’s Wreck Inventory.

Each red dot on the map represents a wreck for which there is a known location. 78% of the wrecks in the Wreck Inventory have no known precise location. If you select a wreck on the map you can read the wreck description. This includes details on the ship name, type of vessel and the date the vessel sank. The details also contain (where available) the wreck summary description which provides details on the vessel's history, voyage, cargo, passengers and the story of its loss. At present only 20% of ships in the database have a summary description.

Repeal the 8th Referendum Results Maps

Ireland has voted overwhelmingly to overturn its ban on abortions. With a two-thirds majority the yes vote won a referendum to abolish the 8th amendment of the Irish constitution, an amendment which has made abortions illegal in Ireland. The Irish government has now promised to overturn the ban and allow legal terminations by the end of the year.

The Irish Times has created a simple interactive choropleth map which effectively shows the landslide victory for the 'Yes' vote across nearly the whole of Ireland. The Irish Times Referendum Results map uses just two colors (blue for 'Yes' and red for 'No') to show the overall result in each constituency. Using only two colors for the map's choropleth color ramp is an effective way to visualize how every single constituency in the country, apart from Donegal, had a majority voting 'Yes'.

Of course there were various levels of support for the 'Yes' vote in the different constituencies. The Irish Times map shows this by allowing users to hover over each constituency to see the percentage of 'Yes' and 'No' votes. The map also has the option to look a little more closer at the 'Yes' and 'No' votes in each constituency. Click on the 'Yes %' or 'No %' buttons and more color stops are added to the color palette to give an overall view of the percentage of 'Yes' and 'No' voters in each constituency.


The Guardian's choropleth map of the referendum results uses more colors. Under 50%, or a no vote, is shown in red. So Donegal still stands out on the map as the only constituency where a majority voted 'No'. The Guardian's use of 6 colors to show the different percentages for voting 'Yes' reveals that constituencies in Dublin (the cut-out map) were most strongly in favor of repealing the 8th.

It is a little too simplistic to say that support for the 'Yes' vote almost radiates out from Dublin but the map does show a small trend for support for the 'Yes' vote to fall away a little the further a constituency is from the capital. However there are probably too many outliers to this general trend to give it too much significance.

Mapping The Irish Famine

Here's the evolution of Irish Population density 1841->2002 on a DED level. You can see the devastating impact of the Famine, the gradual thinning of the rural population and the late-20th c. suburban sprawl #history #ireland #rstats pic.twitter.com/SOwSyHvPIN

— Alan Fernihough (@DiffusePrioR) March 9, 2018

On Friday Alan Fernihough Tweeted a truly shocking animated map which shows how the population of Ireland was devastated by the Irish Famine. The map shows population density in Ireland for every year from 1841 to 2012. It reveals the devastating effect of the famine on the population of Ireland -an effect so devastating that the population of Ireland was larger in the first half of the 19th Century than it even is today.

Alan's website The Irish Famine Project provides an interactive map which allows you to explore in more detail the effect of the Irish Famine on individual parishes. If you select a parish on the map you can view details on the parish's pre-famine and post-famine population and the overall percentage fall in the population.


The map uses data from a wide number of sources, including the 1841 and 1851 census. If you click on the 'more information' link in a Parish's information window you can view a more detailed breakdown of the pre- and post-famine population. This includes details on the drop in the male and female populations.

Mapping the Irish Rebellion

I've been experimenting a lot recently with the Leaflet-IIIF plug-in. The plug-in allows you to display IIIF manifests in Leaflet maps. This map of Van Gogh's Self-Portrait Dedicated to Gauguin shows how you can use the plug-in to pan & zoom around an IIIF manifest. While this Compendium of Victorian Map Games shows how you can load different manifest URLs into the same Leaflet map.

One of the main advantages of using Leaflet to display IIIF manifests is that you can switch between a map and an IIIF manifest with some ease. In other words Leaflet can be used to show the location of geo-tagged images and provide an interface in which you can pan & zoom around these very same images. You can get a better idea by looking at this demo map of Dublin 1916.

This map uses a number of postcards created after the 1916 Rising in Dublin. These postcards are held by the UCD Digital Library. The map shows the location depicted in each of the images. If you click on a marker then you can view the postcard selected and pan & zoom around the image.

Switching between a basemap map layer and an IIIF manifest is not as straightforward as you might think. The reason for this is that the map and the IIIF manifest use different map projections. Therefore you need to change the map projection every time you switch between a manifest and the map.

Mapping the 2016 Irish Census

The Republic of Ireland's All-Island Research Observatory has collaborated with the Central Statistics Office to create a new mapped visualization of data from the 2016 census. The Census 2016 Viewer provides mapped visualizations of more than 130 different census variables.

Using the Census 2016 Viewer you can explore all aspects of the 2016 census, including population density in Ireland, the distribution of different religions, ethnic backgrounds, family types, occupations and class. The mapped visualization for each socio-economic variable provides a choropleth view of the selected variable. You can also click on the map to view the percentages and counts in the area (for example the percentage of Roman Catholics in the selected county).

The map also includes a  useful chart tool which allows you to create charts for a number of different socio-economic variables based on the current map bounds or for your own defined area on the map.

A Game of Thrones Filming Locations

It is said that long ago, before the Doom when dragons still flew above the towers of Tyria, Valyrian wizards could use the magic of obsidian candles to see across vast distances. A wizard could light a candle in the Valyrian Freehold in Essos and instantly spy on the Hand of the King, across the Narrow Sea in the Red Keep of King's Landing.

With the rebirth of the dragons the magic of obsidian candles is active once again. To use this ancient magic you must own the ancient scroll called Game of Thrones Filming Locations in Causeway Coast and Glens. Used properly the spells in this ancient text can instantly transport your sight to the Dothraki Grassland, the Coast of Dorne, the Stormlands or to many other locations throughout the lands of Westeros and Essos.


Dragonstone, as shown with dragon's view on the magic map of Esri

Each location that your inner vision visits is highlighted upon the magic map of Esri and shown from above with magical 'dragon's view' images. The magic map of Esri also includes ancient words of wisdom about each of the locations that you visit on your magical journeys. These words of old provide a brief history of each location and the role it has played in the long history of this Land of Ice and Fire.


There is also an ancient spell of 'Street View' which can bestow the gift of long vision onto anyone who owns the 'Map of Google'.

Game of Thrones: The Old Views and the New gives you the vision to stare straight as the dragon flies into King's Landing, Winterfell or the mysterious continent of Essos. Google's collection of magical Street Views is split into three main Houses, the Starks, Lannisters and the Mother of Dragons. This allows you to direct your gaze to any of your favorite locations on either of the continents of Essos or Westeros.

If you wish to explore the lands of A Game of Thrones even more then you might also want to consult The Five Maps of Westeros.

The Irish Singles Map

If you are looking for love in Ireland then you need the Irish Singles Map. This interactive map from the Irish Central Statistics Office uses data from the 2016 census to show you where all the single men & women are living in Ireland.

You can consult the map to find locations nearby with the most singles. For example, if you live in Dublin, you should head for a night out in Maynooth, where over half of all the men and women are unmarried. Avoid nearby Ballyoulster though. There are only 73 single males and 59 single females left in Ballyoulster.

You can find more interactive maps of the 2016 census in Ireland on the CSO Census website. Look under '2016 Census Results' and search for the 'Interactive Maps' section under each heading.

Dublin - Easter Rising in 3D

The 100th anniversary of the Easter Rising has easily become the most mapped historical event of this year.

Maps Mania has already featured a review of Google and Ireland 2016's mapped audio and visual guide, Dublin Rising 1916-2016. Ireland 2016's map includes a Street View tour of some of the important locations in the Easter Rising, narrated by actor Colin Farrell. We have also featured RTE's Reflecting the Rising, a map which includes fascinating video and sound recordings of personal accounts from men and women who lived through Easter 1916.

The City and the Rising is perhaps the best of them all. This map from Dublin City Council features images, text and videos that connect incidents and events of the Easter Rising with locations across the city.This multi-media content is displayed on top of vintage map of Dublin.

My favorite part of The City and the Rising, however, has to be the incredible 3d maps which you can view of a number of important locations in Dublin. These 3d maps were made from archive photographs, maps and documentary sources to recreate how Dublin actually looked in 1916.

Therefore With The City and the Rising you can not only learn more about the events that took place in and around Dublin's General Post Office (for example) you can also explore the GPO and O'Connell Street in 3d. In fact, if you have an Oculus Rift headset, you can even view the 3d scenes in virtual reality.

The Geo-Genealogy Map of Ireland

St Patrick's Day is the one day of the year when everyone around the world pretends that they have Irish ancestry. So why not enter your name into the Geo-Genealogy Map of Irish Surnames to see where your Irish ancestors might have lived in the 1890's.

The Geo Genealogy Map of Irish Surnames uses data from the 1890 census to show which families were living where in Ireland at the end of the nineteenth century. The surname labels on the map represent the relative birth counts of names. The larger a surname label appears on the map then the more people with that name were living in the county. If you zoom in on a county then more surnames will appear on the map.

You can also use the search option to find out where people with a specific surname were living in Ireland in 1890. Search for a surname and all the counties where people with that name were living are highlighted on the map. The searched name is also shown in bold on the map.

The 1916 Easter Rising

In Easter week, 1916 a group of Irish Republicans rose against British rule in Ireland and seized key locations in Dublin and proclaimed an Irish Republic. To mark the one hundredth anniversary of the Easter Rising Ireland's national public service broadcaster RTE has released a special website, Reflecting the Rising,

The website explores the history of the Easter Rising and provides a guide to events taking place in Dublin to mark the uprising's centenary. Reflecting the Rising also include a fascinating Leaflet map of video and sound recordings of personal accounts from men and women who lived through Easter 1916.

If you select a marker on the map you can watch or listen to the recordings directly from the map.


To mark the 100 year anniversary of the Easter Rising Google and Ireland 2016 have also released an interactive Google Street View tour of Dublin, exploring the historical events that took place during the uprising at different locations around the city. The Dublin Rising 1916-2016 tour provides an audio and visual guide to the Dublin Rising.

The tour features prominent Street View images of key locations in the uprising, accompanied by an audio guide (voiced by actor Colin Farrell) to the events that occurred during Easter week in 1916. Each of the Street View scenes includes map markers which allow you to view historical photographs and listen to modern recordings of statements made by witnesses to the Easter Rising.

Mapping Medieval Dublin

Dublinia is a fantastic way to explore Viking & Medieval Dublin. The site shows how the city grew from a small Viking settlement into a large walled Medieval town.

Dublinia presents an oblique view of the capital, showing how the city developed from 800 AD to 1500 AD. A timeline control allows you to view a series of oblique views of the city for every decade from 800-1500 AD. Select a date from the timeline and the map updates to show you a view of the city for the chosen year.

The map includes a number of map markers which allow you to learn more about a number of Dublin's historical landmarks. If you click on a marker you can watch a video explaining the importance and development of the landmark. Each of the videos includes wonderful animated 3d models and an audio commentary about the chosen landmark's history.

Dublinia also includes a magnifying glass map control, which allows you to view a lens map view of modern Dublin, beneath the historical oblique view of the city.

The Easter Rising Street View Tour

This year marks the centenary of the Easter Rising in Dublin, Ireland. In Easter week in 1916 a group of Irish Republicans rose against British rule in Ireland and seized key locations in Dublin and proclaimed an Irish Republic.

To mark the 100 year anniversary of the Easter Rising Google and Ireland 2016 have released an interactive Google Street View tour of Dublin, exploring the historical events that took place during the uprising at different locations around the city. The Dublin Rising 1916-2016 tour provides an audio and visual guide to the Dublin Rising.

The tour features prominent Street View images of key locations in the uprising, accompanied by an audio guide (voiced by actor Colin Farrell) to the events that occurred during Easter week in 1916. Each of the Street View scenes includes map markers which allow you to view historical photographs and listen to modern recordings of statements made by witnesses to the Easter Rising.

Dublin Story Maps

Storymap Ltd have created two interactive maps of Dublin, in which local people tell their stories about the city and their own lives. Dubline - Storymap presents a route across Dublin, from College Green to Kilmainham. Along & around the route are a number of map markers representing the interesting stories of Dublin and its people.

By clicking on the markers you can watch videos in which Dubliners will regale you with fascinating stories about some of the locations along the route. For example you can hear about Dutch Billy, the most abused statue in Dublin, a gunfight between students and a fellow of Trinity College, and how an elephant came to die on Essex Street.


Storymap is a charming Google Map that captures the personality of Dublin city through Ireland’s age-old tradition of storytelling, presenting a vision of Dublin as told through its stories and storytellers.

If you are ever lucky enough to visit Dublin you can be sure that the locals will talk your ear off. Storymap takes advantage of the Dubliners' love of telling a good tale by presenting the city through the stories of the local people. 

The map itself is a collection of videos in which Dubliners tell the stories of locations around the city. The stories include the strange tale of the first cat to fly across the Irish Sea.

Vintage Maps of Ireland

S Wilson has a nice collection of geo-rectified vintage maps of Ireland. The Historic Maps of Ireland collection includes vintage maps ranging from John Speed's 1610 Map of Ireland up to an 1897 Map of Ireland by Matthews-Northrup.

As well as the vintage maps of Ireland the site also includes collections of Historic Maps of Dublin City and Historic Maps of County Dublin. All the maps can be viewed in separate Google Map pages.


S Wilson has also used the Google Maps API to create a map of Grafton Street showing the names of all the shops, businesses and residents in the street in 1848. The data for the map comes from 'a combination of the Thom's Directory street listing published that year and several maps of the area'.