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  • A traditional road map of the Pittsburgh area and one showing the same region on an iPad are seen together in Moreland Hills, Ohio. Transportation agencies around the country are printing fewer maps to cut costs or just to acknowledge that public demand is down. The Associated Press

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July 4, 2012

With advent of GPS, map companies hedge bets

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COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — Used to be, Dad would stuff a half-dozen maps in the glove box before setting out with the family on a road trip to see the waterfalls at Yosemite or the granite faces of Mount Rushmore. Colorful maps bearing the logos of the oil companies that printed them — names like Texaco, Gulf, Esso — once brimmed from displays at filling stations, free for the taking.

Websites like MapQuest and Google Maps simplified trip planning. Affordable GPS devices and built-in navigation on smartphones downright transformed it — and transportation agencies around the country are noticing, printing fewer maps to cut department costs or just acknowledging that public demand is down.

The drop in sales began around 2003, when affordable GPS units became the go-to Christmas present, said Pat Carrier, former owner of a travel bookstore in Cambridge, Mass.

"Suddenly, everyone was buying a Garmin or a TomTom," he said. "That's the year I thought, 'Oh, it's finally happened.'"

But Charlie Regan, who runs the maps division for National Geographic, said the company has sold more paper map products in the past three years than it has ever sold since launching the division in 1915. He attributed it to customers learning to appreciate good map data — and also noted that sales of international maps have remained consistent, and that sales of recreational hiking maps are on the rise.

"It's almost like a golden age in mapping. More people than ever before in history are using maps every day," he said. "For me, that's fantastic, and it's an opportunity."

What most people agree on is that paper road maps will not go away quietly, like pay phones and phone books. Chris Turner, a collector from Jeffersonville, Ind., shook his head at the notion of paper maps becoming obsolete.

"With a GPS or other mapping system that you might use, you feel like you're beholden to the GPS lady. You know? 'Turn left here. Recalculating.' Well, with a map, you can trace your route and you can decide for yourself still where you want to go.

"And if you want to vary from the GPS lady, so be it," he said. "But you're armed with that knowledge from that map to do that."

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