Lab #7 - Spring Break Flight Map

What are your plans for Spring Break? Want to travel to the hottest spots at the lowest prices? Check out this interactive Spring Break Flight Map for the best deals on Spring Break travel on a college budget. Flight routes are color-coded based on price; darkest blue meaning cheapest flights and darkest red meaning most expensive. Click on each flight route to get the cheapest flight information for that destination. All flights leave from LAX on March 20th and return March 29th, 2009. Click on each destination icon to get a photo and more information about that particular hotspot. There are 18 total Spring Break locations to choose from, based on recommendations from various travel websites’ top Spring Break picks. All flight information is from kayak.com.


View Larger Map

Lab #6 - Dots, Symbols, and Shades

Ansel Adams Backpacking Trip 2008

View Larger Map

Lab #5 - GPS (a.k.a. "If only the GPS unit worked in the ucla underground tunnels...")

Unfortunately, the GPS device has a large margin of area, so the accuracy of the map below is sub-par. Furthermore, we only took points on the eastern portion of campus. It looks pretty cool though.

Lab #4 - 10 Maps of Italy

Lab #3 Map Discussion

Below are three maps showing the AIDS rate among adults (age 15-29) in sub-Saharan African countries. Using the exact same variable (AIDS rate), each map represents the data in a different way. Given the nature of the variable I am mapping, there are clear advantages and disadvantages to the choices I made in presenting data with each respective map.

Map #1 in my opinion lays out the data in the most clear and user-friendly fashion. In this map, I represented each country with a different color which corresponds to the adult rate of AIDS in that country. The legend clearly states the percentage of adults with age each color corresponds to. I find this to be the most straightforward representation of the information at hand.

Map #2 uses graduated dots centered on each sub-Saharan African country to represent the AIDS rate of that country, larger dots corresponding with a higher percentage of adults with AIDS. While this is also a pretty clear and straightforward representation of the information, I think that it may be harder for map users to distinguish between different sizes of a dot with the same color and shape than to distinguish between color. Also in this case, the dot may interfere with the country label, making the map slightly more confusing to read.

Map #3 is the most misleading and convoluted representation of the AIDS rate. First of all, the legend only distinguishes between minimum, mean, and maximum AIDS rates for all the sub-Saharan countries, with countries falling between these values represented by dot densities between those listed in the legend. Aside from the obvious flaw that no actual numbers are given, just relative rate among sub-Saharan African countries, this is also the most misleading map of them all. Since the AIDS rate in each country is represented by dot density, this manifests itself as a series of points in the country. This would imply that the points are specific objects, such as the location of hospitals or AIDS victims, rather than a representation of a percentage. This "dot density" may be a good representation of point-specific data, or for data having to do with the number of people with AIDS in that particular country, but is terribly insufficient for representing a rate.

These maps illustrate how the same information can be presented in many ways, and the relative success of each choice for its intended purpose. For a statistic like population density, the dot density could be a good and straightforward representation of that variable. For a country's GDP, for example, both graduated colors and graduated dots would be good choices. For my particular variable, I think the graduated colors is by far the best option to make the map most readable and aesthetically pleasing.

Source: UNAIDS/WHO 2008 Report on the global AIDS epidemic

Africa AIDS Map #1

Africa AIDS Map #2

Africa AIDS Map #3

Lab #2 Map Discussion

Below are two versions of the 2008 Election Map. The first map (below) is a precise replication of the New York Times Election Map from the New York Times website. The above map is my own creative elaboration of the original map, containing additional information to make the map more interesting to viewers. My intention was to turn the election map into a fun, splashy, cartoon-like image, comparing the standard election map to the proportional electoral map of the 2008 election, representing each state's size by the number of electoral votes granted to that state. Showing the U.S. states proportional to the number of electoral votes it has creates a more understandable representation of the distribution of votes. As you can see, the original map seems to have more U.S. land area colored red, seemingly indicating a Republican win. This can be misleading, since many of the "red" states, though large in area, are sparsely populated and thus have a small proportion of the country's electoral votes. It may be confusing to viewers how Democratic candidate Barack Obama won the election even though the majority of states appear to have voted Republican. Juxtaposing the two maps allows viewers to understand the area-population inequality of the United States, and makes it more clear how many votes actually went to the Democratic candidate, Barack Obama. I added cartoon images of the two candidates, attempting to illustrate their respective probable reactions to the outcome of the election, as well as cartoon-like font. I also added bright colors in an attempt to give my own map more personality than the original.

Standard vs. Electoral Election Map

Replicate President Map

Lab #1 Map Analysis

Juxtaposing these three maps, even the untrained eye will be able to draw a few obvious conclusions. First of all, it is apparent that the vast racial majority of our country is white. There is a particularly high density of whites in the upper midwest and northeast, and a relatively low density of whites in the south, southwest, and in California. The relatively low density of whites in the southwest and in California is most likely attributed to the proximity of these areas to Mexico, where a high Latino population probably makes up for the lower percentage of white population. However, without a map of percent of Latino population per county, this speculation cannot be corroborated.


Comparing the map of black population to white population, it appears that the high density of blacks in the south explains the relative shortage of whites in this area. The black population appears to have the most contained distribution of the three census maps, with a very low percentage of blacks occuring outside the south, with the slight exception of parts of the west. This phenomenom is likely leftover from the slave trade, when millions of African slaves were brought to the Unites States, and the majority of these to southern plantations.


While the asian population seems to be more scattered than the black population, it is concentrated in a few specific areas, including the west coast, northwest, and east coast. There is a particularly high density of asians in the San Francisco/Bay Area of California, which explains the relatively low percentage of whites in this area. The concentration of asians on the coasts may be attributed to the proximity of these areas to the ocean, where asians may have arrived by ship.

Percent of Black Population by County

Percent of Asian Population by County

Percent of White Population By County

Los Angeles Bike Paths

Looking to avoid nasty LA traffic while getting exercise and sparing the air? Get a bicycle, and use the map below to get where you need to go!