Connectivity Atlas is an amazing project that visualizes all man-made transportation, communication and energy infrastructure on a single map. At the same time it removes all borders, oceans and in fact everything else… The map visualises only roads, pipelines and Internet cables but surprisingly (at least for me) it is more than enough to precisely draw the world’s geography. It can read at the website:

“Infrastructure connects and defines us. The roads, pipelines and Internet cables that deliver our services also shape our opportunities, our vulnerabilities and our identities. Political maps abound, yet there are few useful, elegant maps of the complex layering of transportation, energy and communications infrastructures that unite us.”

The atlas is fully interactive and it allows you to show and hide all the layers. Interestingly all the data used is open and available for reuse including Submarine Cables data from TeleGeography. The project has been developed by DevelopmentSeed, and the University of Wisconsin-Madison Cartography Lab, in collaboration with Dr. Parag Khanna, author of Connectography: Mapping the Future of Global Civilization.

Cool project!