Author Archives: Andy Woodruff

About Andy Woodruff

I grew up as a regular visitor to Boston, my mom being a native (a BU alumna from Malden), and became an area resident when I moved to Cambridge in 2008 after finishing graduate school in Wisconsin. That's a lifetime short of being a real "local" by the standards around here, but I'm doing my best. I think I can at least imitate the Boston accent better than most people from my home state of Ohio. My day job is being a partner in Axis Maps, where we do custom interactive cartography and also sell typographic map posters. Sometimes I also post things on my personal site, too. Cartography is more than a day job, though; I've been exploring Boston by mapping it since I got here—by foot, bicycle, train, and study. There's hardly a better way to learn about and appreciate the city.

Bostovalentinography

Posted on February 14, 2011 by

9,872 smoots. That’s how far I walked to make this deformed heart map for Valentine’s Day. That’s a GPS track of my path around Boston and Cambridge (and a bit of Somerville) to trace something like a heart shape. Over … Continue reading →

Posted in Geography, Holiday, Photography, Seasonal | Tagged , , , , | 9 Comments

Conquering eagles and geese

Posted on January 25, 2011 by

I don’t want to take this site too far down the road of posting historical items that are interesting merely for being historical, but it’s worth mentioning a first that Boston can claim. In 1860, from a balloon tethered on … Continue reading →

Posted in Historical, Photography | Tagged , , | 3 Comments

Food as Boston

Posted on January 18, 2011 by

No, not a thoughtful post about the geography of food in Boston. It’s more the other way around. First, we’ve all seen the vegetable Boston from Jen of Tiny Urban Kitchen, right? It’s possibly the best thing ever. Second, when … Continue reading →

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A Bostonian’s Idea of the United States of America

Posted on January 4, 2011 by

It’s hard to argue that humility is one of Bostonians’ virtues. Hub of the entire freaking universe? Yikes. No more humble, of course, is the object of our inferiority complex, New York. With massive pride comes a (geographically, at least) … Continue reading →

Posted in Geography, Historical | Tagged , , | 8 Comments

Merry Christmas, Boston, unless you’re colorblind

Posted on December 24, 2010 by

If so, just enjoy this map of ambiguously colored dots. This will be clarified at a later date. It’s this, but in Christmas-y red and green, for part of Boston. In 1898.

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MBTA visualizations

Posted on December 20, 2010 by

If you haven’t noticed—and I sure hope you have if you ride the T—MBTA schedule and location data are infinitely more accessible than they were about a year and a half ago. A couple of guys at the nascent Massachusetts … Continue reading →

Posted in Transportation | Tagged | 4 Comments

This is Bostonography

Posted on December 13, 2010 by

Greetings, Bay Staters and curious outsiders. This is Bostonography. My name is Andy Woodruff. I am a cartographer and one-fifth of Axis Maps. I have lived in the Boston area for a little over two years, having arrived in Cambridge … Continue reading →

Posted in General | 14 Comments