The Maps of the Week

This week, in my never ending quest to discover new on-line maps, I kept coming across WNYC's Average Commute Times Map.

The map uses data from the last U.S. census to display a heat map of the average commute times for each zip-code area. Using the map you can find out how your commute times compares with the average amongst your neighbors and also visualise the differences in commute times in different neighborhoods across the country.


The Arms Globe is a beautiful and fascinating visualisation of the world's arms trade over the last eighteen years.

Using the interactive globe it is possible to select individual countries to observe their imports and exports of arms and ammunition for any year since 1992. The globe also displays to which countries arms have been sold and from which countries arms have been bought.


On a less sombre note this week I also liked Paris en Chansons, a simple map of Parisienne music.

The map displays 200 songs that are rooted in the geography of Paris, either through reference to a district or neighborhood, or to an individual street, a dock or a bridge of the city. Users can click on any of the displayed songs and listen to the song itself directly from the map.