The Journey, not the Arrival
- Apr 15, 2018
- 3 min read
For three years I worked with a big inter-agency and multiple institutional team to make a new map of San Francisco called Nature in the City. The official launch is this Wednesday at the Fisher Bay Observatory at the Exploratorium. All are welcome – you have to RSVP. The press release for the map notes that our team was motivated to inspire stewardship and lasting engagement with the environment among city dwellers. We also did it to support the nonprofit Nature in the City, which works to restore habitat for native species right here among the pavement and the buildings. For me there was more. I wanted to learn how to make a map. I’m a writer usually bound by the constraints of one sentence after another unfurling in straight line after straight line. I wanted to stretch myself into the world of spatially-explicit visualization where it is also possible to capture the dimension of time.
One reason to make a map of nature is that we seem to be living by flat narratives that do not convey the full effects of nature's beauty and necessity. Nature is multi-valent, operating at many time scales, whirling on in microcosms and in macrocosms. Written narratives can approximate this – Ulysses and Finnegan’s Wake by James Joyce take a crack at it, but these mega works are essentially about language and recent human history. And if there is one thing the Anthropocene is teaching us, its that something much bigger is unfolding here, having to do with geological time and involving all life forms. Now we see the theater we are playing in is large beyond our ken yet at the same time delicate, and vulnerable to our easy degradations. We are revising our sense of what it means to be human -- where we belong, how we belong.
From our Mission Statement:
The name of our map is “nature in the city,” but could more accurately be described as “the city in nature.” The city, after all, is a human-built structure that occurs within a larger, much older, and unfolding world. Wildflower blooms, emerging butterflies, racoon and coyote pups issue from the nature within which we are embedded in ongoing cycles. Fledgling hawks migrate across the Golden Gate every fall and have done so for more than 10,000 years.
Random notes:
GET AT MULTIPLE SCALES
GLOBAL IMPERATIVE TO CHERISH OUR LOCAL ECOSYSTEMS AND UNDERSTAND THEM AS PART OF REGIONAL, CONTINENTAL, AND GLOBAL FRAMEWORKS
A MAP IS AN ORIENTATION
PUT THE INDIVIDUAL HUMAN AND AGGREGATE SOCIAL GROUPS "IN PLACE"
A MAP IS A HYBRID OF HUMAN KNOWLEDGE AND DESIRE
So I’m the writer of the map. What that means is that first of all, I had to aggregate all the dimensions of nature and knowledge of places and species that our team of experts identified as important to depict on the map. But you can’t just show every piece of information on a map. You have to be selective, to consolidate, and to express the unfolding of time, you have to tell stories. Below is a day in the life of me as I grappled with information and how to shape it.
This is Alison Young’s elegant doodling from one meeting.
Probably the biggest creative moment for me came when I thought: aha! Let’s have one big map on the front, and four explanatory maps on the back, which can trace a historical trajectory of species evolution and human impacts. Ironically I basically made a four-part linear narrative which could actually serve as the outline of a book. I learned that a map isn’t SUCH a different beast after all.
The fact that these homely sketches eventually became our beautiful map is still kind of astounding. And so here’s what we’ve got. The front side of the map depicts a “big picture” and the back tells (true) stories about how we understand it: as a shaped city engineered by tectonic, ocean, and human forces; a gardened city planted to transform historic sand dunes into greenery; a creative city in which landscapes and species are restored and increased; and a connected city in which historic wildlife and water corridors intersect with contemporary movement pathways.
In addition to the Exploratorium event, we will be presenting at SFMOMA’s Public Knowledge program on June 28. Find out more about the map here: http://natureinthecity.org/map
What stood out to me most was the idea that a map is more than a tool for navigation—it's a way of telling stories across space and time. That perspective really makes you see cities differently. It's funny how we often look for shortcuts in other areas of life, whether it's thinking "Take my online class for me" or trying to skip the hard parts of learning, but your post is a great reminder that the journey of understanding and creating is where the real value lies. Thanks for sharing this behind-the-scenes look at the process.
The launch of the Nature in the City map at the Exploratorium sounds like a wonderful way to reframe how we see urban ecosystems, especially the idea of "the city in nature" vs. "nature in the city." It reminds me how creative projects can help translate complex, layered experiences into something more tangible, much like turning lyrics into song. That mapping process of selecting and consolidating information to tell a story is a skill in itself.
What a fascinating journey from simple sketches to such a thoughtful and inspiring map! I love how it highlights the connections between geology, ecology, history, and community. Projects like this become even more impactful when they're accessible to diverse audiences, and Translation Services can help share these important stories with people from different linguistic backgrounds. Wishing you a great presentation at SFMOMA!
I really appreciated the perspective that a map is more than a wayfinding tool—it's a way of understanding relationships across time, place, and ecology. The idea of framing it as "the city in nature" is especially thought-provoking. Reading about the creative process, from rough sketches to the final product, was just as interesting as the map itself. "Take my online class" oddly came to mind as a reminder of how valuable it is to make space for meaningful, long-term creative work like this. Congratulations on such an impressive collaboration.
What a thoughtful reflection on how maps can reshape the way we understand our relationship with nature. I especially liked the idea that it's really "the city in nature," not the other way around. Your perspective on combining storytelling with spatial visualization is inspiring. As someone who enjoys learning across different fields, I can also appreciate how resources like online course help can support people who want to build new skills—whether it's mapmaking, environmental studies, or science communication. Thanks for sharing such an insightful journey.