annotating maps of cities

April 3, 2017 12:04 PM

Looking for software for annotating maps, not cloud based, that will let me zoom in and out, add flags/notes/icons to specific locations on street maps (or other images), and print out maps at arbitrary resolution.

I create fairly detailed annotated maps of cities before I visit them, showing pre-selected restaurants, food stores, transportation hubs, cool places to visit, where I'm staying, etc. I look at them _offline_ for various reasons (often, the best times to examine them are in transit and out of data range, and I also go out of cities sometimes). It's too much work to do the way I've been doing it, though, and I'd like some kind of software solution.

I've resorted to stitching together printscreens of map views in Photoshop, then marking the places of interest in that document, then exporting as a PDF and printing out on paper (it's not always easy to read a phone screen due to size and lighting issues). This works OK - the resulting PDF can be zoomed in and out and printed at different resolutions - but it's much more labor intensive than it really needs to be.

This has, though, been tremendously helpful! I can see where points of interest to me cluster and choose routes and lodging appropriately, I can figure out where I can chain together two or three destinations in a short amount of time, and I can choose, for example, a transit station that's maybe a longer walk away but close to a good restaurant or a nice park.

It also helps me learn a place well enough to find my way around without constantly having to refer to a device or even a map.

Any suggestions? This seems like a common problem that might have been solved in 2001. I'm willing to go vintage, especially if the map data is up to date. Modern would be better, of course.

Maybe some kind of note taking software that allows geographically-based notes? Maybe something that's really about zooming in and out of diagrams or other images and annotating those?

So, to summarize:

- not cloud based
- works with no Internet connection
- fine degree of detail so I can indicate locations on a specific street intersection
- ability to zoom out so I can see "clustering" of points of interest
- allows printing both zoomed in and zoomed out

* even if there's not a perfect all-in-one solution, a better/faster way to create those PDF maps would be helpful too.

I'm using Windows 7.

Thanks in advance. Please please let there be something!

(Maybe someday I can make a shareable map of the vegetarian restaurants of Paris or something).

posted by amtho to Grab Bag (9 answers total)

ArcGIS or Grass GIS or qGIS should do it, but they are not easy to use.
posted by rachelpapers at 12:23 PM on April 3, 2017 [2 favorites]

Not sure how 'offline' this is for you, but I've been using Maps.me (or MapsWithMe) on my phone with the map downloaded for offline use. I then drop pins and notes on them (they call them bookmarks), which lets you see them zoomed in or out or filter by sets, like restaurants. It doesn't fit your PDF need but I think it meets the rest of your needs.
posted by thewumpusisdead at 12:39 PM on April 3, 2017

Response by poster: Is that the main purpose of those GIS softwares? If so, I might be willing to consider trying one. Maybe there are add-ons or companion/connecting programs that would make this more possible?

I think I downloaded GrassGIS a while ago, but didn't get further than starting it the first time.
posted by amtho at 12:39 PM on April 3, 2017

I have used a free app called Maps.ME for similar annotated mapmaking for vacations and it's great! I don't think it quite checks all your boxes but does get at least a few of the basics: works offline, highly detailed maps, you can add annotation markings and stars, you can import KLM map files. Bonus: it does pretty decent distance estimates and walking directions.
posted by forkisbetter at 12:40 PM on April 3, 2017

I use OsmAnd on my Android devices, though I've never tried to print maps out. It draws its data from the OpenStreetMap project, which also appears to be the data source for Maps.me. Maybe some of the other software listed for OpenStreetMap would work on Windows and have similar features?
posted by XMLicious at 12:54 PM on April 3, 2017 [1 favorite]

Also, I should mention that OsmAnd has a whole plugin system for adding features to the program, so if you have an Android device (iPhone too, I think?) you can use it on but the standard types of annotations don't do what you want you might be able to find a plugin that does more elaborate annotations.
posted by XMLicious at 1:00 PM on April 3, 2017

Thirding Maps.Me, though I don't know about printing. But I use it for the exact same thing as you (creating maps of places I'm visiting) and it downloads OpenStreetMap tiles, which can be used with no internet connection. It's a great app.
posted by Happy Dave at 1:23 PM on April 3, 2017

Mapbox Studio Classic? (Unfortunately they are now working on a more cloudy, paid service, but this app is open source and will be potentially supported by someone else if they completely abandon Classic.)
posted by floatboth at 2:30 PM on April 3, 2017

Are you aware that you can annotate google maps, then right click and print to PDF?

The GIS apps would be much more flexible, of course, but google maps is easy. (Btw, someone might have already created a map of vegetarian restaurants in Paris that's available to share.)
posted by she's not there at 4:37 PM on April 3, 2017