Cognitive Readability Enhancing of Cartographic Maps for Pedestrian Navigation

Human activities are embedded in the space. They frequently use their spatial cognition in familiar space, or navigation aids (e.g., cartographic maps and satellite navigation systems) in unfamiliar areas for positioning and way-finding purposes. Today, satellite navigation systems are widely used by even non-expert users because of their abilities in friendly interaction with the user. They find the optimum path to a certain destination and navigate the user through it using automatically movement and rotation of the digital map regarding the user’s position as well as direction of movement. Dealing with cartographic maps, however, need prior knowledge and experience on map reading as well as enough spatial cognition. Users of cartographic maps must accomplish all of the way-finding, positioning and orientation tasks by themselves through connecting the elements of the environment and the map. Enhancing the cognitive readability of cartographic maps increases their usability for navigation more easily in unfamiliar environments. This paper represents the result of enriching cartographic maps with features used by pedestrians for navigation in urban areas.