Federal Government Released all Topographic maps for free

Posted April 22nd, 2007 by Red90

As of April 1, the federal government has opened the complete national topographic database up to the public for free.

http://geogratis.gc.ca/geogratis/en/collection/criteria.do

You have a choice of:

1) Canmatrix which are raster (bitmap) versions of the maps in 300 dpi GeoTiff format. These can be opened with any image viewer and most raster based mapping software such as Oziexplorer or Fugawi.

2) National Topographic Data Base which are vector versions of the maps in ESRI's Arcview shape format. Arcview is "the" software used by GIS professionals. Unfortunately it costs around $2500, so is not a great option for the masses. There are free ways to get the data into Garmin mapping format but it is a bit tedious at the moment. We are working on a more user friendly solution.

John

‹ possible tool Calgary Area Trail Maps ›