Buffalo in 50 Maps

New from Belt Publishing - the third book of their "50 Maps" series, Buffalo in 50 Maps is now out. Previous books on Cleveland and Detroit have been briefly covered on previous blog posts. The author, cartographer Victoria Johnson-Dahl was kind enough to send me an advance copy that I can mine for some inside looks. Here's a map of the age of housing.

The city follows a typical pattern of expansion out from the center with the newest housing (in red) being infill development after the city was completely built out by the mid-late 20th Century. The city also has a history of segregation and building expressways through minority neighborhoods to help suburban commuters get downtown. The disparities between the mostly black east side of the city and other areas is clear on many maps including this one showing access to supermarkets.

There are some large food deserts on the east side where residents have to travel up to 2 miles to get to a full service grocery store. This map includes the store on Jefferson Avenue that only recently re-opened after a racially motivated mass shooting took place there. In addition to the horrors that area experienced they also had to deal with the inconvenience of losing one of the only two supermarkets on the entire central east side.

On a lighter note there are various maps showing local quirks. Here is where you can smell Cheerios being toasted at the General Mills plant on Kelly Island.

This map shows where the fruit trees (in red) are found in the Fruit Belt neighborhood.

Finally here is a detail from one of my favorites-a map of invasive species, including an alligator named Scajaquada Jack, named for the creek where he was found. He was captured after several days, fed some chicken wings and sent down to Florida.

If you want more details about where people drive cars into buildings, where you can see fiberglass bison and how long it takes to get to a Bills game then this is the only book you'll ever need.  You can buy it  here. If you're in Buffalo on Friday you must can attend a panel and book signing.