I love maps of all kinds. Two stories about such maps this week caught my eye.

The first story, from the New York Times, was about the interactive map New York City created to help locate all the pipes in its sewer system. The Times story tells of how for nearly a decade, the Bureau of Water and Sewer Operations has been scanning its archive of old engineering maps to create this new map.

The story notes, â¿¿Most of those old maps are covered with notes about changes and updates to the system, as are the tens of thousands of index cards that also record field data about the grid beneath us. Some of those maps and cards date back a century and a half, and the system they describe â¿¿ 6,000 plus miles of pipe â¿¿ is both a study in sober city planning and a miracle of improvisation.â¿¿

While the map of the sewer lines are deemed sensitive and not available to the public, the surface map created to provide reference points for the sewer system is available.

As the author of the story notes, it is a bit clunky in comparison to Google maps or Map Quest. However, I liked it because I could easily layer all sorts of information over the map. As the story notes:

â¿¿With a few clicks, you can pull up an unbelievable wealth of information about any address or neighborhood. You can find the nearest greenmarket, the year of construction on almost any building, the record of restaurant inspections in the neighboring blocks, etc. In other words, the surface map is really a map to all the maps hidden within it. It is an extensive municipal guide to New York City, organized geographically.â¿¿

The other story was another Times story about Google Earthâ¿¿s addition of a virtual reconstruction of ancient Rome under Constantine the Great, circa A.D. 320. At the time, Rome had more than a million inhabitants.

The reconstruction is the brain child of Professor Bernard Frischer, director of the University of Virginiaâ¿¿s Institute for Advanced Technology in the Humanities, who has been trying to bring ancient Rome to virtual life for over 30 years. The story says that the Google Earth feature is based Professor Frischerâ¿¿s Rome Reborn 1.0, a 3D reconstruction first developed in 1996 at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), and then improved since them with partners in the United States and Europe.

The Ancient Rome 3D reconstruction has some 7,000 buildings, with around 250 being highly detailed.

To make use of Ancient Rome 3D, you will need to install the Google Earth software at earth.google.com, select the Gallery folder on the left side of the screen and then click on â¿¿Ancient Rome 3D.â¿¿

A 2.0 version is now being worked on to show Rome at different historical periods.

I can hardly wait.

If you have found an interesting map online, why not send in a comment with the link? Only one link per comment, or the spam filter will send it to the junk pile.