Document Type

Article

Department or Administrative Unit

Geography

Publication Date

5-4-2022

Abstract

In many parts of the world, motorized travel is one of the most common ways that people interact with their regional landscape. This study investigates how travelers' understandings of place might be influenced by what landforms they can see from a vehicle. It uses a cumulative viewshed analysis on the Washington State (United States) highway network to determine which physical landscape features are most frequently visible or obscured from the road. Adapting ideas from Kevin Lynch's The Image of the City, I propose spatial data processing methods to derive landmarks, edges, and districts that could most contribute to the mental maps of travelers and should be prioritized for labeling on print, electronic, and augmented reality maps. Other applications of the cumulative viewshed include deriving scenic byways, siting proposed construction for high or low visibility, and guiding conversations about critical toponymy and perceptions of place.

Comments

This article was originally published open access in Geographica Helvetica. The full-text article from the publisher can be found here.

Journal

Geographica Helvetica

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Rights

© Author(s) 2022

Language

English

Download
Contact Author

Share

COinS