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I'm the map, I'm the map, I'm the map... (1 Viewer)

TheIronSheik

SUPER ELITE UPPER TIER
This is a follow up question to the "do you know how weather radar works?" question I asked a while back.

It's two parts.

1) On a blank map of your state that only shows county lines, can you pinpoint your location?  (In this case, "your location" would be your house.)

2) Can you name every county that touches the county you live in?
 

I'm always blown away how bad people are at geography.  You'll see a snow map posted and people will comment "How much snow for my area?"  There's literally a map there showing what you're asking.  So for the first question, I can always point out where I am on a map.  As for the second question, at first I thought, "Of course I can."  But then I realized, I can only name the counties that border mine that are in PA.  My county touches both MD and DE and I don't know them.  Not sure if it's because they are different states or because they are the furthest counties away from me.  But either way, even after looking them up the other day, I still can't tell you what they are right now.

 
This is a follow up question to the "do you know how weather radar works?" question I asked a while back.

It's two parts.

1) On a blank map of your state that only shows county lines, can you pinpoint your location?  (In this case, "your location" would be your house.)

2) Can you name every county that touches the county you live in?
 

I'm always blown away how bad people are at geography.  You'll see a snow map posted and people will comment "How much snow for my area?"  There's literally a map there showing what you're asking.  So for the first question, I can always point out where I am on a map.  As for the second question, at first I thought, "Of course I can."  But then I realized, I can only name the counties that border mine that are in PA.  My county touches both MD and DE and I don't know them.  Not sure if it's because they are different states or because they are the furthest counties away from me.  But either way, even after looking them up the other day, I still can't tell you what they are right now.
Easy Peasy. What do I win?

 
This is a follow up question to the "do you know how weather radar works?" question I asked a while back.

It's two parts.

1) On a blank map of your state that only shows county lines, can you pinpoint your location?  (In this case, "your location" would be your house.)

2) Can you name every county that touches the county you live in?
 

I'm always blown away how bad people are at geography.  You'll see a snow map posted and people will comment "How much snow for my area?"  There's literally a map there showing what you're asking.  So for the first question, I can always point out where I am on a map.  As for the second question, at first I thought, "Of course I can."  But then I realized, I can only name the counties that border mine that are in PA.  My county touches both MD and DE and I don't know them.  Not sure if it's because they are different states or because they are the furthest counties away from me.  But either way, even after looking them up the other day, I still can't tell you what they are right now.
1) Yes.  Absolutely

2) Not here in NJ...I can probably get 2/3 of them...but when we lived in Virginia, I could name all the adjacent and probably 3/4 of the ones adjacent to those.

Side-note - I have a pretty good ability to identify places from the air - I think it's because of all my time flying when I lived in VA.  I've been able to spot our house several times on approach to Newark Airport.  The flight paths often go over our house - albeit at an altitude far too high to be any impact at the house, but low enough to see details on the ground.  I can usually find things on google maps satellite very quickly without needing to search just by geography and physical landmarks.

Speaking of google maps, I followed the Google Street View vehicle out of the office a few months ago, and I'm finally google street-view famous.

 
How often do you really need to know the name of a county besides your own? 

How many CBSAs in your state can you name? Do you know your house's latitude and longitude coordinates? 

 
I don't see the county maps very often except on TV during weather events, so they are a bit tricky, even though I have lived in the same county for 30+ years of my life.

I can always spot my county since it is shaped like Oklahoma.  I have a general idea which direction each county is from mine, but get them mixed up when looking at the map.

 
How often do you really need to know the name of a county besides your own? 

How many CBSAs in your state can you name? Do you know your house's latitude and longitude coordinates? 
As I said, it pertains to being able to understand a weather forecast.  So if the local met says "A tornado is moving through Smith County and headed due east", you'd be able to say, "Crap.  Smith County is due west of us.  I should be ready for a possible tornado."  Things like that.

A lot of networks will put a map up in the corner of the show and color counties based on the watches and warnings, so knowing which county is yours would be important.  The thought is that if a large portion of the population can't read a map, then those types of warning systems are useless and they need to figure out a better way.

 
I recognize the names of all counties in our local network's viewing area, but I would probably get a couple wrong if given a blank map and told to fill it out. Same story with where I grew up on the other side of the state - I may have a cursory knowledge of a county's existence but if I only go there once every several years that's all it is.  I have a general idea where they're all located though.  And I also understand that relative to most others I am a weather nerd.

 
This is a follow up question to the "do you know how weather radar works?" question I asked a while back.

It's two parts.

1) On a blank map of your state that only shows county lines, can you pinpoint your location?  (In this case, "your location" would be your house.)

2) Can you name every county that touches the county you live in?
 

I'm always blown away how bad people are at geography.  You'll see a snow map posted and people will comment "How much snow for my area?"  There's literally a map there showing what you're asking.  So for the first question, I can always point out where I am on a map.  As for the second question, at first I thought, "Of course I can."  But then I realized, I can only name the counties that border mine that are in PA.  My county touches both MD and DE and I don't know them.  Not sure if it's because they are different states or because they are the furthest counties away from me.  But either way, even after looking them up the other day, I still can't tell you what they are right now.
Yes/Yes, with a reasonable definition of "pinpoint". I'm sure I'd be within a half mile without any landmarks.  

 
As I said, it pertains to being able to understand a weather forecast.  So if the local met says "A tornado is moving through Smith County and headed due east", you'd be able to say, "Crap.  Smith County is due west of us.  I should be ready for a possible tornado."  Things like that.

A lot of networks will put a map up in the corner of the show and color counties based on the watches and warnings, so knowing which county is yours would be important.  The thought is that if a large portion of the population can't read a map, then those types of warning systems are useless and they need to figure out a better way.
:shrug:

our city spells out the temperatures using city names, not counties.  I get your drift about weather alerts, but I hear the county names announced and I just know that they are all rural and all west of me.  I really don't pay attention to these alerts since I have apps on my phone that show the weather radar and temporal changes. 

 
yes and yes...no problem with either of these.  There are six other counties that border the one I live in.

 
Except for the Omaha and Lincoln areas, The first 1 or 2 digits of Nebraska license plates start with a county number.  (ex. 5 is Dodge County, 66 is Cherry County).  The number was based on the number of registered vehicles in the county at the time they went to the county number systems.  Plates in Omaha used to start with 1, Lincoln was 2, but they now start with 3 letters.

 
Except for the Omaha and Lincoln areas, The first 1 or 2 digits of Nebraska license plates start with a county number.  (ex. 5 is Dodge County, 66 is Cherry County).  The number was based on the number of registered vehicles in the county at the time they went to the county number systems.  Plates in Omaha used to start with 1, Lincoln was 2, but they now start with 3 letters.
Ahhh...no such thing in Ohio.

 
Ahhh...no such thing in Ohio.
Some companies still give out promotional items (ice scrapers, small vehicle calendars) with the county numbers on them.  It was always fun when we were on vacation as kids and you could say, "Hey, that car is from <neighbor county>"  Just a bit of useless trivia.

Iowa plates have the county name on them.

 
This is a follow up question to the "do you know how weather radar works?" question I asked a while back.

It's two parts.

1) On a blank map of your state that only shows county lines, can you pinpoint your location?  (In this case, "your location" would be your house.)

2) Can you name every county that touches the county you live in?
 

I'm always blown away how bad people are at geography.  You'll see a snow map posted and people will comment "How much snow for my area?"  There's literally a map there showing what you're asking.  So for the first question, I can always point out where I am on a map.  As for the second question, at first I thought, "Of course I can."  But then I realized, I can only name the counties that border mine that are in PA.  My county touches both MD and DE and I don't know them.  Not sure if it's because they are different states or because they are the furthest counties away from me.  But either way, even after looking them up the other day, I still can't tell you what they are right now.
Yes to both questions.

I post photos to Landmark hunter and Bridge hunter so I can pretty much name the 14-16 counties of NW and north central PA.

 
Very easy to identify my county (and even my town within it).

Loudoun Co, VA is the red county identified on this map. The inward curve on the county, shown better on this map comes from the Potomac River on it's way south to DC. My town of Leesburg is on the 'point' of that curve. So on Radar maps that don't even show counties, it is easy to identify where we live due to them always showing the state borders via the Potomac River.

I know the counties in VA better than those in MD, north of the Potomac.

 
Very easy to identify my county (and even my town within it).

Loudoun Co, VA is the red county identified on this map. The inward curve on the county, shown better on this map comes from the Potomac River on it's way south to DC. My town of Leesburg is on the 'point' of that curve. So on Radar maps that don't even show counties, it is easy to identify where we live due to them always showing the state borders via the Potomac River.

I know the counties in VA better than those in MD, north of the Potomac.
Sweet. I used to live in Leesburg from 99-02. Beautiful area.

 
Very easy to identify my county (and even my town within it).

Loudoun Co, VA is the red county identified on this map. The inward curve on the county, shown better on this map comes from the Potomac River on it's way south to DC. My town of Leesburg is on the 'point' of that curve. So on Radar maps that don't even show counties, it is easy to identify where we live due to them always showing the state borders via the Potomac River.

I know the counties in VA better than those in MD, north of the Potomac.
Sweet. I used to live in Leesburg from 99-02. Beautiful area. 
You would be surprised how much has changed here, the area is growing incredibly. We moved here in 2010 and tons has changed since then!

 
You would be surprised how much has changed here, the area is growing incredibly. We moved here in 2010 and tons has changed since then!
No doubt. My older son was born at the hospital down on Route 7 (?). I lived in Leesburg and traveled to Reston or Alexandria to work. It was nuts then; I can't even begin to imagine how bad it is now.

 

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