Putting “Go” on the map

30 August 2010, 2:49am

Ordnance Survey and Monopoly joined forces this week to produce a London map plotting the squares featured on the Monopoly board and pinpointing the location of “Go” to mark the 75th anniversary of the ever-popular family game.

Launched earlier this year, OS OpenData was the best way to create a bespoke map for Monopoly’s celebrations. From the range of free Ordnance Survey data available within OS OpenData, OS VectorMap District was chosen as the base for the new map.

Tom Satterthwaite, Ordnance Survey Product Manager, said, “OS VectorMap District is highly customisable and was the perfect choice to map the locations of the Monopoly board. The team stripped OS VectorMap District back to basics to allow for the Monopoly data to be overlaid and stand out clearly. The map of London was quickly transformed to highlight the roads and areas shown on the Monopoly board before adding the locations and the title deeds for each property and station.”

Ordnance Survey also took on the huge responsibility of pinpointing the location of “Go”. Taking in to account all the locations on the board the mapping agency revealed that famous Monopoly square, “Go”, is centred on the Lambeth North Tube Station, close to the Queen’s Walk area, next to the London Eye.

Rob Andrews, from Ordnance Survey, comments: “It has been fantastic to work with Monopoly and solve the 75 year mystery as to where the exact location of “Go” is.

“By using Ordnance Survey’s latest digital product, OS VectorMap District, we were able to accurately locate “Go”. We mapped the positions of Mayfair and Old Kent Road, which sit either side of “Go”, and then accurately calculated that Lambeth North tube station was the central point between the two and therefore the location of “Go”.

“As well as plotting “Go” on the map we also marked the locations of all the other Monopoly board positions. The final ‘Monopoly map’ looks great and really brings the game to life giving it a whole new dimension.”

OS OpenData allows users to download a wide range of mapping and geographic information for free reuse direct to their computers, view maps and boundary information for the whole country, and develop web-map applications using Ordnance Survey’s OS OpenSpace API (application programming interface). You can find out more about OS OpenData on our website.

www.ordnancesurvey.co.uk

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