From the air you see more patterns in the landscape than when you stand with your feet in the clay. This is evident from the new Bosatlas Nederland van Boven, which gives a good overview of what is currently happening in our country. The atlas is a nice combination of aerial photos and informative maps.
The atlas is structured on the basis of twenty locations along an imaginary 'flight route' from the Wadden (Ameland) to the south (Zeeland), north again to the North Holland peat area, then south to South Limburg and north again to finally reach Texel.
Along this route, various themes are touched upon, such as the origin of the Netherlands and the different landscapes. But also current themes such as the risk of flooding, the growth of cities, transport and other economic activities. The more everyday subjects such as leisure activities, telephone behaviour, sports and events also have a place. Not always things that you expect in an atlas, but that could possibly come in handy in a (broad) subject such as geography, for which this atlas is also intended.
Return Texel – Amsterdam
The atlas builds on the VPRO television series Nederland van Boven, but, unlike the TV series, wants to “mainly provide the lines and patterns with an interpretation”, the authors write. The aerial photos are largely from photographer Karel Tomeï. A few special data visualisations, compiled by the VPRO, provide a picture of things that cannot be captured photographically, such as the higher layers of the sky. Very funny is the representation of the route (and flight height!) that a Texel black-backed gull travels in twelve hours:her foraging place is .... the Amsterdam canal belt.
Themed atlases
Today, geography is fortunately much more than just topography and the publisher of the famous Bosatlas is participating in this broadening. The Bosatlas of the underground Netherlands was previously published, but it didn't stop there. The Bosatlas of the Netherlands waterland, the Bosatlas of the climate and the Bosatlas of energy soon followed. Some thematic atlases have been compiled in collaboration and with funding from companies and knowledge institutions and are also aimed at use in (secondary) education, partly due to an additional supply of teaching materials.
Transformation in one century
An impressive map from this Bosatlas – which has more pages than the previous themed atlases – shows a comparison between land use now and a century ago (it is not a new image but was previously not easy to find in such a high resolution) . It shows the enormous transformation that our country has undergone since 1900. What used to be heath and peat, is now - measured in surface area - urbanized area. It relentlessly shows how we have changed the top layer of the Netherlands and also shows the irreversibility of this influence.
Old enemies
The choice for many additional maps is not surprising because a connection had to be made between the many photographic images. This is the case, for example, with the water lines, a string of fortifications with areas in between that can be artificially flooded. Beautiful photos in the atlas related to the protection against enemy attacks are e.g. the Ringwalburg in Oost-Souburg in Zeeland, which dates back to the time of the Vikings, and Fort Pampus as part of the Defense Line of Amsterdam, built for protection of attacks from the IJ.
Combination of extremes
While leafing through this atlas you realize more and more that our country consists of a combination of very old and very new landscapes that contrast strongly with each other. Remnants of Ice Age landscapes are a stone's throw from urbanized, densely populated areas. From the air it is also easy to see how intensive the transport is. In addition to 'highways' in the air, there are 'highways' in the North Sea. The dominance of car use shows the parking lot at Schiphol. But due to intensive agriculture, large areas are still empty.
From space you can see more
Science is also increasingly using images from the sky and space. A profession such as geoarchaeology, for example, does that. Color differences of the earth (due to a different soil composition) may indicate foundations of prehistoric buildings. More attention could have been paid to this in the Bosatlas van Nederland van Boven. Topics that are now a bit outside the scope such as health, population and immigration, could have been left out. Satellite images would also have been a welcome addition. But that could be the subject of a next atlas.