Irish Political Maps
covers
elections throughout the island of
Ireland from the 19th
century to the present day, with maps
showing the results of Ireland's many elections and
referenda, as well as the different
constituencies which have been in
use throughout the last 200 years.
I had the idea for the site in late 2010, in response to the lack of this kind of resource on the internet in general. If there can be dozens of maps for American presidential elections and British parliamentary elections, I figured there can be maps for Irish elections too. After taking some time to figure out a workable means of mapping Ireland's somewhat complex electoral system, I began making some test maps. Once I had ironed out the mistakes, I finally created this site on 8 May 2011, uploading several of these initial maps to begin with.
Almost immediately, the site was picked up by some prominent bloggers (to whom I'm very thankful), as well as gaining attention on the Politics.ie forum. From there the site has developed. The presidential election in 2011 saw the site earn attention from RTÉ, the Irish Times and TheJournal.ie, something I wouldn't have thought possible when I started it. I am very grateful to you, my visitors, for helping to make this site such a success, and I have always been greatly encouraged by the support and well-wishes of visitors who have found Irish Political Maps informative and useful.
Irish Political Maps remains a work in
progress, with new maps uploaded
regularly. Several of the map series are incomplete, but I hope to close these gaps before long. This is a project I undertake in my spare time, so there are occasions where I am unable to add new updates as regularly as I'd like.
The
maps are my own work, as is the written text that accompanies
each post. The figures presented on each the maps are calculated
from the official records kept by the Department of
Environment, Community & Local Government. Maps relating to
Northern Ireland and pre-independence Ireland are calculated
from election details contained in Brian M. Walker's
"Parliamentary Election Results in Ireland" book series, from which the details of electoral constituencies in Ireland from 1801 until 2007 have also been taken.
Thank you for reading. I hope you enjoy Irish Political Maps.
Jason
