Coast lines : how mapmakers frame the world and chart environmental change /Mark Monmonier.

In the next century, sea levels are predicted to rise at unprecedented rates. These rising water levels pose serious challenges to the cartographic definition and mapping of coasts. Setting sail on a journey across shifting landscapes, cartographic technology, and climate change, the author reveals that coastlines are as much a set of ideas, assumptions, and societal beliefs as they are solid black lines on maps. Whether for sailing charts or property maps, coastlines challenge mapmakers to capture on paper a highly irregular land-water boundary perturbed by tides and storms and complicated by rocks, wrecks, and shoals. The text is peppered with captivating anecdotes about the frustrating effort to expunge fictitious islands from nautical charts, the tricky measurement of a coastline's length, and the contentious notions of beachfront property and public access. Combing maritime history and the history of technology, this book charts the historical progression from offshore sketches to satellite images and explores the societal impact of coastal cartography on everything from global warming to homeland security. In the post-Katrina era, when the map of entire regions can be redrawn by a single natural event, the issues raised here are more important than ever.