Evaluation of IOF events maps
World Masters Orienteering Championships 2005, Edmonton,
Canada, 22-31 July
Map Commission's general comments (ISOM maps (long, relay, middle)
- Model1
- Model2
- Model3
- Qualifier 1
- Qualifier 2
- Final
Terrain
The championship took place on three different areas.
The first qualification took place on an terrain denominated Medicine Hills. It
is divided in two distinct areas: one with dominating uncut grass fields and sparse
deciduous thickets on swamps and another with predominating deciduous forest with
many swamps covered with trees. The two areas are divided by long straight fences.
Few small lakes and streams with many beaver dams are on both areas..
The second qualification took place on a terrain denominated Tiger Lily (a flower
abundant there). It is an uncut forest, mainly conifer, with small open areas
along hill crests and sparse swamps. The terrain is cut by two long streams with
many beaver dams.
The final took place on terrain denominated Wildland, an uncut forest , mainly
conifer, with large mainly forested swamps separated by long hill crests.
All three terrains are rather flat. For instance, in the third map all the swamps
all over the map are limited by the same index contour or by the contour immediately
lower.
Field work and drawing
All the three maps are at the scale 1:10000 with 5 meter contour interval.
The first two maps were made by two different cartographers. The third cartographer
is not nominated, apparently a different one. The three maps however, are drawn
with similar characteristics.
The fieldwork, for the areas covered by my personal course (not very large of
course) looks very accurate. The main orienteering objects are contours and
vegetation details and they both were very well represented on the maps.
Very few point objects are present on the three maps:
- not one single boulder or rock cliff
- few brown crosses (brush pile) on the first and second map
- few brown half circles (small depression)
- very few brown dots (knoll) and brown full ellipse (elongated knoll)
- four or five green circles (single tree) on the first map
- four black circles (oil well in out-of-bound areas) on the first map
- four or five black crosses (man made feature) on the last two maps
- about 10 green crosses (rootstock) on the third map
- few green dots (bush) on the second and third map.
In the second map a new generalised area symbol was introduced on two small areas:
green dots over half-yellow (rough open land with scattered bushes).
Of course we may have overlooked some of the point features, but the number reported
gives a general idea.
Location of control points
The great majority of control points were on contour details, some 10-20% on
vegetation details. In the first qualification also some swamp border was used.
Point objects used as control point were:
- one brush pile on the first qualification
- three small depressions, two elongated knolls and two knolls in the second
qualification
- one small depression, one knoll and one man made feature (the final point:
a bear statue) in the final.
Printing
Apparently all maps were printed on the same place.
The paper seems to us of good quality, definitely white.
The five colours are not perfectly superposed, however the misplacement is low.
The tones of the colours are acceptable, however:
- yellow is a little stronger and more orange than the standards,
- green is darker than the standards,
- blue is a little stronger than standards,
- brown is close to the standard.
Readability
The map readability is very good (this is a key issue for the masters). From
this point of view the characteristic of the terrain helped a lot: few point
object, rather flat land and smooth landforms and therefore spaced contours
with wide bends. Also, swamps and area of thick forest are generally large.
Clearings and small forest areas within them are the only detailed vegetation
objects that need some accurate reading (obviously, full green and half-green
areas within 20% green areas are not so important for navigation and were never
used for control points).
Conclusion
The maps were of good quality. Printing could be slightly better.
The new symbol (green dots over half-yellow) is a good one (but not according
to the actual standard).
