The Big Map began in late 2003 as a blank slate to fill in. Over time, "big map" became an intransitive verb, as in "we'll go big map in Queens this weekend." Eventually it evolved into a transitive verb where anything and everything could be "big mapped". We big mapped 5th Avenue in Sunset Park, for example. We also big mapped discarded christmas trees. We've even big mapped the laundromat down the street.

Julian Dibbell wrote about the Big Map in the Village Voice -- "Shuttered: Who will remember all the crappy pizza joints fading into NYC history?" (August 31, 2005).

The Not For Tourists website featured the Big Map in a Radar listing (July 26, 2007)

Big Map Key

There is a main page for each borough that features a clickable map which in turn takes you to individual neighborhoods and/or geographic sections of each borough.

The Explore button is the shortcut to the entire list of individual pages for each borough.

The Feed button takes you to food and dining pages for each borough, including menus from places we've eaten at.

The Citywide button features pages and/or things that are not restricted to a particular borough.

Finally, the Get Out of Town button takes you to that which exists beyond the five boroughs.

How To Big Map YouTube Video

Big Map Resources

Burrows, Edwin G. and Mike Wallace. Gotham: A History of New York City to 1898 (Oxford University Press, 1998). See also Gotham Center.
Caro, Robert A. The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York (Vintage, 1975).
Ellis, Edward Robb. The Epic of New York City (Kodansha America, reprinted 1997).
Gayle, Margot and Michele Cohen. Manhattan’s Outdoor Sculpture, (Prentice Hall, 1988).
Hagstrom Map. New York City 5 Borough Pocket Atlas. See also.
Jackson, Kenneth T., ed. The Encyclopedia of New York City, (Yale University Press, 1995).
Stokes, Isaac Newton Phelps. The Iconography of Manhattan Island, 1498-1909. 1916. (Reprinted Arno Press, 1967).
Walsh, Kevin. Forgotten New York: Views of a Lost Metropolis (HarperCollins, 2006). See also Forgotten NY.
White, Norval and Elliot Willensky. AIA Guide to New York City (Times Books, 4th edition, 2000).
Works Progress Administration. The WPA Guide to New York City: The Federal Writer's Project Guide to 1930's New York. (Reprinted Pantheon Books, 1982).
Newyorkology
Chowhound
Wired New York

Notes
An asterisk (*) next to a link indicates an outdated page. Check Google's cached pages for the link or the Internet Archive.

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