General Command of Mapping (Turkey)

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The General Command of Mapping (GCM) is the National Mapping Agency of Turkey and is responsible for the official topographical mapping of the country in both hard-copy and digital forms.

The GCM produces and provides geographic information for defense and development purposes, in addition to planning, standardizing, producing and maintaining geographic materials.

GCM has a team of experts and two B200 Beechcraft planes.

GCM has the capacity for aerial coverage of any country and is open to any proposal from any international bodies in need of aerial coverage.

[edit] History

Turkish mapping dates back to the 15th century. The charts drawn by Ibrahim Mursel, as well as the world chart painted in nine colors on a deer skin by the famous navy commander of the Ottoman Empire, Admiral Piri Reis, are some of the first spectacular examples of Turkish mapping. From this century up until the end of the 19th century, a great number of maps, charts and similar works can be found, reflecting the historical aspect of Turkish Mapping.

The establishment of the Mapping Commission in 1895, as a unit subordinate to the Fifth Department of the Turkish General Staff, is accepted as the beginning of modern cartography in Turkey. The Mapping Commission is also considered the precusor to the General Command of Mapping, the current organization. The Mapping Commission performed its preliminary works in five or six rooms reserved for them on the upper floor of the old Gendarmerie Office.

Since the rapid production of the maps needed urgently for national defense required a larger and more capable organization, the Mapping Commission was arranged on October 28, 1918. The Commission was established as an independent mapping department of the Ministry of National Defense, which by that time had several branches: triangulation, topography, reconnaissance, cartography, central offices, a surveying battalion and a surveying school.

The Mapping Department, which moved to Ankara from Istanbul after the Turkish War of Independence, was settled in the Attar Basi Khan in Koyunpazari, which at that time was almost downtown; and the printing section also started its work in the building, which is today the School of Arts in Ulus. In 1924, the Department, which is still inside the General Directorate Garrison, moved to the hut-like buildings located between the Military Sewing House and the General Directorate.

After this settlement, maps and plans needed by the governmental bodies, universities, private companies for development purposes were produced rapidly in line with the changes laid down after the foundation of the new state, The Turkish Republic. In light of the recent developments, there arose a need to make a new arrangement for the organization of the Department. Lieut. Gen. M. Sevki (Ölçer), who is now regarded as the founder of the General Command of Mapping, recognized this Department and the organization thereof to be of vital importance, and prepared together with his team a bill for the new organization, the General Directorate of Mapping, and sent it to the Ministry of National Defense in early 1925. According to the legal procedure, following the approval of Ministry of National Defense, the bill was passed to the Prime Ministry to be discussed in the Ministerial Council and presented then to the Turkish Grand National Assembly, the final authority to pass the bill.

As a result of the bill, the law No.657 was passed by Parliament on May 2, 1925. The new law authorized the re-organization of the Mapping Department under a new name, the General Directorate of Mapping reporting to the Ministry of National Defense and made the National Mapping Agency (NMA) responsible for the production and provision of all kinds of maps and plans to meet the requirements of Turkish Armed Forces and all governmental bodies, namely, ministries, universities as well as private companies and individuals, for both national defense and development purposes.

At the time, the General Directorate of Mapping had the following departments:

• Astronomy and Triangulation,
• Topography,
• Leveling,
• Photogrammetry,
• Geology,
• Cartography,
• Mapping Battalion,
• Surveying School and the Science Committee

The Law No.657 was amended with Law No.203 on January 2, 1961. Due to the policies created by the Inter-Ministerial Commission for Coordinating and Planning of Mapping Affairs and to the instructions set forth in the By-Law for Supply and Usage of Maps and Mapping Information, the General Directorate of Mapping was renamed in 1983 to the General Command of Mapping. Along with this change, the GCM was entitled to produce maps at scales smaller than 1/5,000. The production of maps at a scale of 1/25.000, which is the base scale, is carried out according to the specifications of the relevant NATO STANAG to ensure standards and interoperability among NATO nations.

[edit] External links

• General Command of Mapping