Can someone recommend a good road atlas of Germany?

Amtmann

I need a decent road atlas of Germany for two main reasons:

1) to show me a comprehensive image of the road network (i.e. autobahns AND smaller, older country roads)

and, more importantly -

2) to show me - in a quite detailed way - small towns, their proximity to one another, and the older roads that connect them.

I personally love the Collins Road Atlas series. They have a good one for France, but none for Germany. The AA road atlases tend to be very cluttered and have a poor colour system, though they are comprehensive.

Is anyone aware of a good alternative?



I will probably be moving to Germany in the autumn for an extended period to research the history of a number of towns in the areas around Hamelin or Schweinfurt.

Any suggestions are much appreciated.

EDIT: German language suggestions are fine by me

Victor

I know there are some good German atlases out here, but the names escape me.

The Michelin series is generally good. most are multi-lingual, so you'll have both the english and German words for features.

Realise that Germany is a big country and that any map / atlas that covers all of Germany can't include detail of every small or medium sized town. You are probably best off waiting until you get there before you pick out local maps - they are much more likely to be up to date.

A GPS unit with a German database might be useful.

You might also ask on the German board: http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/forumdisplay.php?f=218

Amtmann

Victor wrote: »

You are probably best off waiting until you get there before you pick out local maps - they are much more likely to be up to date.

Good point. For the moment I am basically looking at a number of key towns scattered across Germany. Examples, as I said, include Hamelin, Schweinfurt and Dinkelsbuhl. I hope to select one of these towns and to make this the centre of a circular research area (which will have, say, a 60-km radius) that also contains a number of similarly-sized or smaller towns. So, at the moment, I don't need a map that is absolutely thorough - just fairly detailed. Like you said, I can get better maps of local areas once I'm there.

Thanks for the Michelin suggestion; I'll look into it.

Victor

Oh, the town councils tend to produce proper town brochures (small books, not flyers) with decent maps of the town.

Alun

If that's what you're after, most areas (Landkreise) will have their own Städteatlas, showing not only the main towns in the area, but all the little villages and such in the immediate area as well down to street level. Falk verlag is a big player in this area, see http://shop.gofalk.com/Falk/Browse/Booxtra.aspx and they also do maps at various different levels, e.g. at Länder level or Region (Ruhrgebiet etc.). There should be something there to suit your needs. Otherwise many areas have their own, locally produced, atlases that are sometimes better IMO, but you'll only know that when you get there.

Chris_533976

Openstreetmap will give you the roads anyway. Its got far more information than Ireland anyway.

munchkin_utd

Michelin does more detailed regional maps of Germany, each region being either a larger state or group of states. Either way, each map covers an area of roughly the 26 counties and maps smaller settlements and has a reasonable enough level of detail in cities. You can buy them here:
http://langenscheidt.com/catalog/browse.php?root_id=21&cat_id=1712

On http://www.viamichelin.com you can see the difference between the national and regional maps as for some of their zoom levels they use proper Michelin Maps rather than generated maps.
Karlsruhe is a good example to search for, on the countrywide map you cant really make out how to get from one side of town to the other, and only larger towns are shown in the vicinity. On the regional map almost every small settlement is shown and it is clear how the main routes run through Karlsruhe.

Chris_533976

Furet BTW you're not going anywhere till the M8 is finished

Amtmann

I won't be around for the M7/M8, that's for sure. I will still be around though for the M-F opening.