other geographies
October 8, 2011 6:36 PM Subscribe
What do these specially marked regions drawn over a US map signify?
It's by county and seems to cover a bit of a swath...meteorology?
posted by rhizome at 6:50 PM on October 8, 2011
posted by rhizome at 6:50 PM on October 8, 2011
Is there any context you can provide on where the image came from?
posted by crapmatic at 7:04 PM on October 8, 2011
posted by crapmatic at 7:04 PM on October 8, 2011
Response by poster: Saw it in a salvage shop, so no context really...
posted by Jason and Laszlo at 7:07 PM on October 8, 2011
posted by Jason and Laszlo at 7:07 PM on October 8, 2011
Can you take a close-up of a few areas? Seeing what's included and what's excluded might help.
posted by cocoagirl at 7:08 PM on October 8, 2011
posted by cocoagirl at 7:08 PM on October 8, 2011
Could be sales regions of some sort. We have a map that's mounted in the same way (big grommet holes for mounting on a wall) that has sales regions colored on it, and we know it came from a company that used it for visualizing sales regions.
Actually, the map looks remarkably similar--maybe 3 x 4.5 feet or so. Particle-board-ish backing, black paper tape around the edge. I can't see yours 100% clearly, but in the bottom left corner, ours says "Cleartype--Lam-O-Tex", "County-Town United States", and "Showing cities and towns with population of 5,000 and over". Looks like yours might say the same, though the smaller towns/regions around the edge are slightly different.
posted by BlooPen at 7:26 PM on October 8, 2011
Actually, the map looks remarkably similar--maybe 3 x 4.5 feet or so. Particle-board-ish backing, black paper tape around the edge. I can't see yours 100% clearly, but in the bottom left corner, ours says "Cleartype--Lam-O-Tex", "County-Town United States", and "Showing cities and towns with population of 5,000 and over". Looks like yours might say the same, though the smaller towns/regions around the edge are slightly different.
posted by BlooPen at 7:26 PM on October 8, 2011
The SoCal region with Clark County NV looks like a sales territory I saw recently for some company. Can't remember the name of the company though.
posted by birdherder at 8:24 PM on October 8, 2011
posted by birdherder at 8:24 PM on October 8, 2011
Illinois is split very approximately at I-70 and I-80, which is a very common division for regions (north, central, south) for everything from state courts to gardening climates. (the top line is too far south for 80 and the bottom line too crooked for 70, but it seems like a straightforward division of the state to some human purpose, rather than, say, water cachement or climate
I am intrigued by your puzzle.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 10:39 PM on October 8, 2011
I am intrigued by your puzzle.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 10:39 PM on October 8, 2011
The top line in IL is way too low for I-80. Looks more like it could be following I-72.
posted by sbutler at 10:45 PM on October 8, 2011
posted by sbutler at 10:45 PM on October 8, 2011
Some observations:
A good portion of the lines are state boundaries.
Great disparity in size of territories – (boot heel of MO, much of WY, CO, NM and TX)
Many states omitted entirely – Northeast, Southeast, WI, MI, AZ, UT, OK, AR
Several states carved in several pieces – IN, PA, OH, WA
In Illinois, the lines appear to follow county boundaries, though not following any particular highway and they omit the northern third of the state which includes Chicago.
Why Los Angeles but not San Francisco?
The lines don’t appear to follow any particular telephone area code. - IA, IL
I’d second BlooPen’s thought that it could be sales regions, though great size differences and omission of large areas of the country make me wonder. Why would you cover New York and not Chicago or Miami?
If you know where the salvage shop may have gotten the map, check history of company they procured it from. What industries in the town have gone out of business?
posted by tronec at 4:09 AM on October 9, 2011
A good portion of the lines are state boundaries.
Great disparity in size of territories – (boot heel of MO, much of WY, CO, NM and TX)
Many states omitted entirely – Northeast, Southeast, WI, MI, AZ, UT, OK, AR
Several states carved in several pieces – IN, PA, OH, WA
In Illinois, the lines appear to follow county boundaries, though not following any particular highway and they omit the northern third of the state which includes Chicago.
Why Los Angeles but not San Francisco?
The lines don’t appear to follow any particular telephone area code. - IA, IL
I’d second BlooPen’s thought that it could be sales regions, though great size differences and omission of large areas of the country make me wonder. Why would you cover New York and not Chicago or Miami?
If you know where the salvage shop may have gotten the map, check history of company they procured it from. What industries in the town have gone out of business?
posted by tronec at 4:09 AM on October 9, 2011
Sales regions seems to be the best idea thus far, but even that seems off. I'm looking at the VA/NC area (which would be massive for a sales region), and in the SW part of Virginia, there is a "group" of counties (Cumberland region) that is its own "region." There's other examples of this in the Ohio valley area. I also find it odd that most of the south is left out.
Even more puzzling is the outlining excludes Michigan, most of Minnesota, and Wisconsin, but extends all the way to Washington state.
Weird. Now I need to stop staring at it obsessively...
posted by kuanes at 4:49 AM on October 9, 2011
Even more puzzling is the outlining excludes Michigan, most of Minnesota, and Wisconsin, but extends all the way to Washington state.
Weird. Now I need to stop staring at it obsessively...
posted by kuanes at 4:49 AM on October 9, 2011
What kind of salvage shop?
(Agreeing with the other poster(s). My zoom and enhance seems to show that it is a standard city/county map with the bolder lines drawn in.)
posted by gjc at 5:39 AM on October 9, 2011
(Agreeing with the other poster(s). My zoom and enhance seems to show that it is a standard city/county map with the bolder lines drawn in.)
posted by gjc at 5:39 AM on October 9, 2011
Possibly a public health/epidemiological map? I've seen outbreaks of disease reported by county, and it would explain why there would be odd clustered hotspots alongside untouched large/populous areas.
posted by apparently at 5:57 AM on October 9, 2011
posted by apparently at 5:57 AM on October 9, 2011
Proposed states that never happened?
posted by FlyingMonkey at 7:59 AM on October 9, 2011
posted by FlyingMonkey at 7:59 AM on October 9, 2011
I vote for sales/marketing planning as well. I also get the impression that the person doing this may have adjusted boundaries a few times, and this might not be the final map. In some places, it looks like state boundaries have been highlighted, possibly just to emphasize them instead of indicating that they're the edge of a 'territory'.
Several areas seem to be attached to commercial centers in one way or another. "Bob, you've got some good leads in Rapid City, so we'll let you handle that out of the Denver office."
posted by gimonca at 11:08 AM on October 9, 2011
Several areas seem to be attached to commercial centers in one way or another. "Bob, you've got some good leads in Rapid City, so we'll let you handle that out of the Denver office."
posted by gimonca at 11:08 AM on October 9, 2011
Pretty much got to be sales territories, or something very similar to that. A lot of them have fairly obvious major cities somewhat equidistant from their boundaries (e.g. St. Louis, Denver, or Chattanooga), while others seem to at least contain a very big city (e.g. Chicago -- presumably covering Wisconsin, Michigan, and parts of Illinois and Minnesota). The disparity in size isn't even really that unusual, as companies that are cobbled together from subsidiaries might have personnel in different areas and you can end up with things like one area covered by a whole office and another area covered by one senior sales guy who operates as an independent contractor.
Something like paper clips would sell pretty uniformly across the US, as well (with variation primarily tied to population density), but not something like, say, sheep-shearing equipment. When I worked for a post-deregulation long-distance carrier, their main territory was Ohio (where they had started laying fiber), but they had offices in New York and Chicago targeting the financial markets. For a long time a fair number of cell carriers had similar, scattered maps.
posted by dhartung at 12:00 PM on October 9, 2011
Something like paper clips would sell pretty uniformly across the US, as well (with variation primarily tied to population density), but not something like, say, sheep-shearing equipment. When I worked for a post-deregulation long-distance carrier, their main territory was Ohio (where they had started laying fiber), but they had offices in New York and Chicago targeting the financial markets. For a long time a fair number of cell carriers had similar, scattered maps.
posted by dhartung at 12:00 PM on October 9, 2011
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by ocherdraco at 6:48 PM on October 8, 2011