Spyke
lemmy.world

As someone of the earth sciences it is my opinion that whoever drew this has exactly zero understanding of "natural geographic borders".

71

Right???? This map changes borders that are already based on rivers and natural geographical features.

33

Nobody got time for that. But yeah this map seems to be more or less randomly generated, it messes with a lot of borders that are already geographically defined. Seems like they just made everything into an irregular shape and assumed people wouldn't look too closely.

US states were in large part created to reflect natural geographic divisions already. They were frequently drawn up on maps before having any significant population centers, so geographical boundaries were the primary focus. A secondary focus being equality, so not making any state too big or small relative to its neighbors.

3

The fact that the Mississippi River isn’t being used as a border anymore in some states bother me. But I’d love to see your take.

23

100% agree. As an Oregonian, that border on the Willamette made me wanna cry. Literally no consideration of nature or people with that boundary, and yet it’s called a “natural border”.

3

Looking at Long Island, I find it interesting that they chose the Hudson River as a natural boundary but apparently Long Island Sound is no big deal

I can’t figure out what Rhode Island’s border is meant to be but it apparently doesn’t include Rhode Island

2
lemmy.ca

Eh!!??!! Stay on your side of the 49th parallel!!

25

Yeah, I see Washington and Montana there. Fuck off with your 54-40 bullshit.

1

Deleware River that is as wide as a 33+ lane highway is not a natural border? Wacky.

3

Mine now. We'll combine it with Atlantic City and make Gotham which will somehow take up like the entire south part of the state together.

1
AA5Breply
lemmy.world

I guess it worked for Kansas City, right? Be prepared for NYC NY, vs NYC CT

4

I get why rivers and creeks and streams were historically convenient borders, but when we started building cities along them it got weird. Then some mf'er invented the bridge and it all went to hell.

5

My heart wants to like this on principle because that's how geography should be divided, but it looks like garbage. I never really stopped before to appreciate how tidy and professional those arbitrary perpendicular lines look.

12

Asking the Colonial powers to not make weirdly straight unnatural borders is like asking Russia to stop invading occupying it's neighbours land

12
lemmy.world

It looks so... gloopy!

I like how some states are basically identical. Florida is a given and NH is just kinda like "what happened to you guys?"

8

NH missed the opportunity of the Merrimack River as a border….. plus the Saint Laurence Seaway up north, oui?

2

I find it beautiful. Something in my subcountious doesn't compute borders in straight line

2
lemmy.world

This makes my brain itch, in the best way. Oklahoma got much bigger, I approve.

8

But we're still doing better than Florida, which had so much more panhandle sliced off, all the best bits, like Destin! F that

2
lemmy.world

I will die before I'm a fucking Wisconsinite. Love, a proud Illinoisian.

8
programming.dev

What specific geographic borders were used? Or is it just sort of random to look organic?

7

I can definitely see the Mississippi River still, so I don't think it's watersheds. Unless they're using peaks and troughs both. I'm sure there's a term for it. My understanding of water shed is that it means everything that flows into a river so a river would be in the middle. So the borders of watersheds are more like mountains than rivers.

5

well the bottom of Georgia has a weird tab sticking out usually because of a river border, so I assume you're right

1

I'd like to see a map with cultural boundaries. As a resident of NE Florida I can say we might as well be part of Georgia.

4

I like the idea of watersheds, especially given gestures generally at US and the sky/climate

3
lemmy.world

As always Florida is Florida It’s a law of nature nothing before nor after can be Florida, Florida is eternal just like the geriatrics in there nursing homes.

2

eternal

Well, at least until it's under water, anyway.

2
lemmy.blahaj.zone

Source? This looks like someone just drew wiggly lines. I would like to know what their methodology is.

2

I can tell a few of the states I know anything about geological speaking are wrong.

I'm guessing they picked a river or mountain range and said, this is the border now. They don't seem to have picked good ones usually.

1
US states if they used more natural geographic borders | Spyke