[EHPweb] Next generation earthquake map

[Thomas M Brocher]

Andy:

Thank you very much for  your thoughtful comments that should help refine 
the Web group's planning.

Tom

Tom Brocher
Center Director
Earthquake Science Center
W: (650) 329-4737, Cell: (650) 644-5927, Fax: (650) 329-5617
brocher at usgs.gov

U.S. Geological Survey, MS 977
345 Middlefield Road, Menlo Park, CA 94025






From:
Andrew Michael <michael at usgs.gov>
To:
Lisa A Wald <lisa at usgs.gov>, EHPweb at geohazards.usgs.gov
Cc:
Thomas Brocher <brocher at usgs.gov>, Jill McCarthy <jmccarthy at usgs.gov>, 
Michael Blanpied <mblanpied at usgs.gov>, David Applegate 
<applegate at usgs.gov>
Date:
09/30/2010 08:56 PM
Subject:
Re: Next generation earthquake map



Hi Lisa et al.,

Tom Brocher forwarded your message to us and I'm pleased to provide some 
comments on the new beta version maps.  Some very excellent features have 
been developed here and I expect that this new infrastructure allows for 
the following improvements.  It looks like you are using the Google Maps 
Javascript API and so I think many of these suggestions are possible.  If 
not, I fear that these maps will actually be less informative than the 
existing static images.  Given the current version, I will continue using 
the older maps for the reasons outlined below.

The good stuff:
1. Obviously the ability to pan and zoom arbitrarily is a wonderful step 
forward.
2. The sliders to select events by event age, magnitude, and depth are 
fantastic.

Some minor upgrades:
1. As long as we are allowing sliders for event age, maybe we can provide 
a longer time window than 7 days.  A month could be nice.
2. The key doesn't explain what the blue circles are.
3. The blue circles would be more interesting if they also indicated the 
maximum magnitude they represent.
4. At the top of the list of events have some text to explain that you can 
sort the columns and click on an event to get more info.
5. Also some text above the map to say that clicking on an event finds it 
in the list and more info.
6. The key could have the light blue color that indicates you have clicked 
on an event.  Maybe "selected event"

Major upgrades:
1. Provide a toggle or slider to control or get rid of the blue circles. 
The structure in the seismicity and how it outlines faults and plate 
boundaries are some of the primary information provided by these maps.  I 
understand the urge to use these circles but they just aren't really 
necessary.  If I look at the old recenteqs CA-NV map at 
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/recenteqscanv/ I can immediately 
see a great deal of structure in the seismicity and can identify that 
there are places where the events are on top of each other and that I 
can't see them all.  On the new map, if I set the scale level and 
magnitude selection to approximately the same settings as the recenteq 
CA-NV map, I am provided with a bunch of blue circles along with some 
scattered individual earthquakes and I would be hard pressed to figure out 
what is going on in terms of earthquakes and faults.  In the early parts 
of a dense aftershock sequence I wonder how far one would have to zoom in 
to get past of the blue circles.  Before or after google runs out of 
resolution in the satellite photos or terrain models? I do understand the 
point of the blue circles and so I suggest a toggle to turn them on and 
off.  That way the user can choose.

2. Faults?  Where are they?  We spend a lot of effort educating people 
about faults and one of the first questions we get about any earthquake 
is, "what fault is it on?"  It looks like faults would be easy to add 
using the polyline functionality in the Google Maps Javascript API.

3. Circles for earthquakes and circles for cities.  Even though they are 
different colors and the earthquakes have shadows (which suggests the 
strange idea that they are above the ground), I find the circles for 
cities confusing.  It makes the cities look like earthquakes with names. 
The recenteqs maps used squares for earthquakes and diamonds for cities. I 
do like the circles for earthquakes.  The squares, I believe, were chosen 
for simplicity of drawing and interpreting clicks but that is no longer 
necessary.  So, I suggest changing the cities if that is possible.  If 
not, maybe experiment with a different shape for the earthquakes.  Or 
maybe this is one problem I will learn to live with.

Hope this helps.  I really do think the new maps can be a huge improvement 
if they can be modified so we can see the structure in the seismicity and 
how it relates to faults.

Cheers,
Andy



On Sep 30, 2010, at 12:55 PM, Thomas M Brocher wrote:

The EHPWeb group has generated a new, fully zoomable version of the 
real-time earthquake maps.  This feature is something that many of us have 
wanted. 

Please take a look and send comments to the group on this Beta version. 

Thank you! 

Tom 


Tom Brocher
Center Director
Earthquake Science Center
W: (650) 329-4737, Cell: (650) 644-5927, Fax: (650) 329-5617
brocher at usgs.gov

U.S. Geological Survey, MS 977
345 Middlefield Road, Menlo Park, CA 94025



----- Forwarded by Thomas M Brocher/GD/USGS/DOI on 09/30/2010 12:53 PM 
----- 
From: 
Lisa A Wald <lisa at usgs.gov> 
To: 
EHPweb <EHPweb at geohazards.usgs.gov> 
Cc: 
Jill McCarthy <jmccarthy at usgs.gov>, Tom Brocher <brocher at usgs.gov>, David 
Applegate <applegate at usgs.gov>, Bill Leith <wleith at usgs.gov>, Michael 
Blanpied <mblanpied at usgs.gov>, Linda Pratt <lkpratt at usgs.gov> 
Date: 
09/29/2010 01:58 PM 
Subject: 
Next generation earthquake map




To the EHPWeb mailing list: 

The EHP Web Team has released a silent beta version (public but not 
linked) of the next generation of real-time earthquake maps on the 
Earthquake Hazards Program website.  We have collected requirements and 
feedback from many of you to create this version. 

We plan to have this beta version online through the end of November.  At 
that time, we will replace it with the public beta version (public and 
linked) that will include updates based on your feedback from the silent 
beta version.  The public beta version will be linked from the EHP website 
but will not yet replace the current Latest EQ Maps until sometime in the 
spring or early summer of 2011. 

Please feel free to forward this email to anyone else who you think may be 
interested and who will want to provide feedback.  A feedback link is at 
the top of the webpage.  Thank you in advance for your comments and 
suggestions! 

http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/mapping/ 

- The EHP Web Team 

--------------------------
Lisa Wald, Geophysicist 
Web Team Manager/Project Manager
USGS Earthquake Hazards Program
Golden, CO 
-------------------------- 



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