New Zealand’s favourite topographic maps can now be viewed in 3D on theBasemaps website.

Toitū Te Whenua Land Information New Zealand (LINZ) recently added the new layer to its free digital service Basemaps, which allows people to explore the country on a web browser from any device. 

LINZ Head of Location Information, Aaron Jordan says around 500 Topo50 and Topo250 maps are now available as a single national map on Basemaps. 

He says the new ‘NZ Topo Gridless Maps’ layer can be turned on, along with the ‘terrain’ function, to show the landscape, features, and contours, as if someone has draped a printed topo map over a 3D model of the country.

“The new layer brings together all our topo maps in the same service, dynamically switching between them to always show the correct scale, from country wide visualisations, down to the neighbourhood scale.

“Our national elevation data underpinning the 3D terrain functionality shines through when exploring at a zoomed-in level, featuring high resolution land details such as farm tracks and river paths.

“When viewing in 3D, it’s a gamechanger for exploring our country digitally using a single resource, and brings new understanding of 2D contours in our topographic maps.

“Anybody from schoolchildren, through to trampers and emergency services can use this map to learn more about New Zealand, visualising the relationship between terrain and the built environment,” says Jordan.

The new topo map layer follows the 3D function we released last year, which elevates any of the available Basemaps layers. 

The 3D feature has been made possible by creating a single national 1m Digital Elevation Model LiDAR (light detection and ranging) dataset.

Basemaps can also be accessed via an Application Programming Interface (API) for use in maps, apps, and decision-making tools.

To explore the new layer, visit our Basemaps site - https://basemaps.linz.govt.nz/@-43.0046471,171.8316650,z6.32,p40?style=topo-raster&i=topo-raster&terrain=LINZ-Terrain&labels=true