{"id":10522,"date":"2012-04-03T18:27:39","date_gmt":"2012-04-03T23:27:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.howderfamily.com\/blog\/?p=10522"},"modified":"2022-04-06T06:12:58","modified_gmt":"2022-04-06T11:12:58","slug":"little-circles","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.howderfamily.com\/blog\/little-circles\/","title":{"rendered":"Little Circles"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

I love circles, which I guess would be an entirely redundant statement on Twelve Mile Circle. I’ve been toying with a concept in the back of my mind for awhile. What it the smallest circle that I can draw on a map that touches the largest number of countries? Google Maps doesn’t offer such a tool and I felt guilty after I badgered them for something like two years to get county lines<\/a>, so I let it slide. Still, I wanted to know.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are radius tools designed by private software developers using the Google Maps application programming interface (API). However I kept hoping Google would cave-in and develop one themselves. It hasn’t happened. Finally I turned to one of the outsider tools<\/a>. Thus, the maps today are not embedded or interactive in any way. They are screen prints. You can’t click on them. Well, you can but they won’t do anything.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Four Nations<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

It made no sense to ponder the smallest circle touching one, two or three nations. That’s just silly. I began my quest by examining four nations instead. I can’t promise I found everything. Hopefully this will get the ball rolling so that others can build upon my platform<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The best example I could find was Botswana, Namibia, Zambia, and Zimbabwe. One can draw a circle with a radius of perhaps a tenth of a kilometre touching all four countries where the Kazungula Ferry crosses Zambezi River (map<\/a>). It might even be a quadripoint. Nobody is completely sure and it would entail definitive surveys by all four nations. I’m not going to spend much more time on this topic because I covered it previously on What Happened to the Handle?<\/a>. I will add one editorial comment though: this spot is high on the list of places I’d love to visit someday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I’ve also discussed the second best example I found, a radius of 1.5 km touching Armenia, Azerbaijan, Iran, and Turkey (map<\/a>) in Fictional Geo-Marathons<\/a>. Ditto for the third, a radius of 17 km touching Austria, Germany, Lichtenstein, Switzerland centered on Diepoldsau, Switzerland (map<\/a>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Map<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Tied for third<\/em>, with a 17 km radius, finally<\/em> I can print a new map. The four nations are Belgium, France, Germany, and Luxembourg, centered practically right atop Luxembourg City. I’ve been to Luxembourg a number of times. It’s a nice place<\/a>, and indeed it’s a convenient way to hit a number of nations with minimal effort. I took a ridiculous trip<\/a> for that very purpose once and I’m not embarrassed to admit it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I found a few other examples.<\/p>\n\n\n\n