Many thanks to Alan (W2AEW) who shares the following tip:

Thomas,

I don’t know about you, but sometimes I find it hard to locate maps for the national and state parks. Some of the parks have good maps on their websites, some do not. Others have maps, but they aren’t detailed enough sometimes to definitively determine if you’re within the boundary or not.

I’ve found that one of the best sources for the national, state and local park boundaries is OpenStreetMap.org. This is a free mapping site. One missing piece is that it does not map National or State Trails very often. But, for park boundaries, it is great.

For example, this map clearly shows that most of Barnegat Light State Park (K-1609) is also within the boundaries of the NJ Pinelands Reserve (K-6609). From experience, I know that this also falls within the NJ Heritage Coastal Trail (K-6544) – thus making it a 3-fer.

At my early activations from this park, I did not know that it was part of Pinelands and thought it was only a 2-fer.

I have also used an app called “onX road” on my phone which can show owners of properties, but in order to see that, it isn’t free.

Just another tool for your toolbox.

Thank you for the tip, Alan! I have not used OpenStreetMap.org as a POTA tool, but I certainly will moving forward. 

I have been using the free app, Parceled, on my iPhone to discover the owners of land parcels–it works brilliantly and is free (so far).

Thanks again, Alan!

If you have a mapping tip you’d like to share, please comment!