Printed topographic maps have been around for centuries, but an American company has added a bit of modern technological sophistication to the map printing business.
MyTopo provides customized printed topographic maps of locations in Canada and the United States within 24 hours, said marketing manager Paige Darden.
“It’s a pretty straightforward service,” she said.
“It’s a low tech product with … paper maps, but we take advantage of the internet to be able to allow people to order a map in a very sophisticated way and print and ship … a map that is much better than they would have been able to get from the government.… We serve a very wide market from agriculture, surveying, forestry, geology to individual hikers and hunter with these maps.”
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Darden said people interested in ordering a customized printed map must start by visiting www.MyTopo.com.
She said customers must provide GPS co-ordinates or geographical features such as a town or lake to search for an area of interest.
Once the specific area is found, the customer is free to change the way the location is displayed on the printed map by making adjustments.
Selecting the paper size along with the map scale is also possible, she said.
Customers can add a longitude and latitude grid, personalize the map with a name or title, preview the final product, choose the type of paper the map is printed on and request that it be laminated.
Darden said map sizes are 18 by 24 inches at a cost of $9.95 US, 24 by 36 inches for $14.95, 36 by 48 inches for $29.95, four by five feet for $79.95 and five by eight feet for $159.95.
The company has digitalized 12,000 map sheets covering the land surface of Canada into its searchable database. The digitized data was provided by NaturalResources Canada.
MyTopo started operation in 1999.
