Welcome!

This site is dedicated to the preservation of Cave Maps and Survey data, as well as to the training of Cave Cartographers.

Surveying in caves is a hard and thankless task. We spend hours in uncomfortable locations working to obtain the data we bring back to create cave maps. However in several cases all the hard work put into the survey and sketching of caves has been lost. Either the data itself is lost due to a catastrophe or negligence or the project leader loses interest in the cave, project, or in several cases, caving altogether, and walks away with data.

I started caving and mapping in Rockcastle and Jackson Counties Kentucky. Over time I saw many great mapping efforts disappear as people went on to other things, and the maps and data were not preserved.

This site was started as an example how the internet can preserve and make available data over long periods of time. It started with Rockcastle and Jackson maps that I had worked on, then friends maps, and now is trying to capture the entire wealth of cave maps in these counties as well as surrounding counties.

Additionally as we built training programs for cartographers, these needed a home. You will find many cartography training classes, programs and powerpoints in the training section





This site was designed with these Open Data Concepts in mind:
  1. Locations are NOT shared
  2. All data is available via scans, Jpegs and PDFs
  3. Nothing is sacred, or owned. You may NOT be the best person for the job
  4. Anyone can pick up a project
  5. Projects in various forms and stages can be shared
  6. Maps as well as raw data are in danger of being lost and should be shared
  7. All other data forms can be shared with the survey data

  8. - Stories
    - Pictures
    - Sketch maps
    - Working Maps
    - Lead lists
  9. Data and Maps to small caves independent of location data pose no additional risk to cave or cave life


We hope to grow this to include all maps within our target areas. However you will NOT find cave locations shared here - instead you will find the data we are working to preserve.