Research Guides: Urban and Regional Planning Research Guide: Images & Maps

Find Images

Read this first. Use the general indexes, databases, Internet links, and printed reference tools listed below to find images. Images might be immediately accessible in the database you search; however, many desired images will only be embedded within another publication, and these are difficult to find unless the images are indexed. You may need to use printed reference tools that index images in books and periodicals. Also consult related subject guides, such as for Art and Architecture, for additional image and map resources.

General Image Resources

ARTstor
A digital library of more than one million images in the areas of art, architecture, the humanities, and social sciences with a set of tools to view, present, organize, and freely download images for research and pedagogical purposes.

archInform (International Architecture Database)
Information on over 12,000 architectural works.
The Atlas of American Architecture : 2000 Years of Architecture, City Planning, Landscape Architecture and Civil Engineering (printed book) Located in Hamilton Reference, click on title for call number.
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Printed resource. Use in library. Click on the title to see the library catalog record with the call number.
British Library Images Online Images Online gives you instant access to thousands of the greatest images from the British Library's collections which include manuscripts, rare books, musical texts and maps spanning almost 3000 years. The range of images available include illustrations, drawings, paintings and photographs. Images available with the option to license hi-resolution images for commercial purposes. Images for educational use are available at 500 pixels.
Cities/Buildings Database
Contains over 5000 images ranging from New York to Central Asia, from African villages, to the Parc de la Villette, and conceptual sketches and models of Frank Gehry's Experience Music Project. They have all been scanned from original slides or drawn from documents in the public domain. They are freely available to anyone with access to the Web for use in the classroom, student study, or for individual research purposes.
Digital Librarian: Architecture & Historic Preservation Extensive list of links to image sites.

Digital Sanborn Maps, 1914-1957 - Hawaii
Digital access to fire insurance maps from various areas in Hawaii. Users have the ability to easily manipulate the maps, magnify and zoom in on specific sections, and layer maps from different years.

Emporis
A large and free-to-use website about buildings. Here you can find any structure, from a hut to a skyscraper, in more than 60,000 cities worldwide. Our audience consists of professionals from the building industry and people with an interest in buildings. Focus is on the full life cycle of a building. You can find buildings from over one hundred years ago to futuristic properties planned for 2020 and beyond.
Great Buildings Online Gateway to thousands of buildings with images, models, commentaries, bibliographies, web links, and more.
Library of Congress American Memory Project
Historical documents, photographs, sound recordings, moving pictures, books, pamphlets, maps, and other resources from the Library of Congress.
Library of Congress Prints & Photographs Online Catalog Include photographs, fine and popular prints and drawings, posters, and architectural and engineering drawings. While international in scope, the collections are particularly rich in materials produced in, or documenting the history of, the United States and the lives, interests and achievements of the American people.
National Atlas of the United States
A comprehensive, maplike view into the enormous wealth of geospatial and geostatistical data collected for the United States.
NYPL Digital Gallery (New York Public Library) Free and open access to over 700,000 images digitized from the The New York Public Library's vast collections, including illuminated manuscripts, historical maps, vintage posters, rare prints, photographs and more.
Panoramic Photographs (Library of Congress)
Approximately 4000 images featuring American cityscapes, landscapes, and group portraits. Subject strengths include: agricultural life; beauty contests; disasters; engineering works such as bridges, canals and dams; fairs and expositions; military and naval activities, especially during World War I; the oil industry; schools and college campuses; sports; and transportation. The images date from 1851 to 1991 and depict scenes in all fifty states and the District of Columbia.
Perry-Castañeda Library Map Collection
A digital collection of contemporary and historical maps in the University of Texas Libraries. Links to maps of all the continents, a detailed directory of map resources for each state, and a guide to map resources on the web.
RIBA British Architectural Library
An index to articles in over 300 of the world's most respected architectural periodicals, details of books and audio visual materials acquired by the RIBA Library. Also indexes the holdings of the RIBA Library Photographs Collection, the RIBA Library Drawings and Archives Collections and a biographical database of architects.
SPIRO (Slide and Photograph Image Retrieval Online)
The online catalog & image database of the College of Environmental Design Visual Resources Center University of California, Berkeley. Includes over 250,000 slides and 20,000 photographs.
Structurae; International Database and Gallery of Structures Images and data on over 40,000 works of structural engineering, architecture, or construction through time, history and from around the world. Documentation begins at the time of the pyramids in Egypt and Roman construction, continues to Romanesque and Gothic churches and through to the Industrial Revolution all the way to today and beyond. Structurae deals mostly with bridges, tunnels, dams, skyscrapers, stadiums, towers, etc.
Visual Collections (Cartography Associates) Over 300,000 images from museums, universities and private collections can be found through this site. Uses the LUNA Insight viewer. Organized into five topics: Cartography; Fine Arts; Architecture; Photography; and Other.
Urban Planning, 1794-1918
An international anthology of articles, conference papers, and reports compiled by John W. Reps, (Professor Emeritus at Cornell University).
WorldImages
Provides access to the California State University IMAGE Project. Contains approximately 80,000 images, is global in coverage and includes all areas of visual imagery. WorldImages is accessible anywhere and its images may be freely used for non-profit educational purposes. The images can be located using many search techniques, and for convenience they are organized into over 800 portfolios which are then organized into subject groupings.