It’s that time of year again. Leaves of various colors, sweater weather and … politics!
Every major news organization has to have an electoral map for the election. These maps try to explain the complex electoral college system and votes needed to win the presidency. They show through visuals and numbers which and how many states vote certain ways and track trends.
Here are a few different interactive electoral maps:
The New York Times
Screenshot of The New York Times electoral votes map
The New York Times has an entire section on the website dedicated to politics. Their electoral map, called Building a Path to Victory, breaks down information in several ways and graphics.
On the top of the page, there is a horizontal bar graph of sorts, showing how many electoral votes Obama and Romney need to win. The Times lists how many people will most likely vote solidly Obama, solid Romney, how many are leaning Obama or Romney and how many are tossup votes. This breakdown effectively explains the numbers that go into winning the electoral college — and the presidency.
The maps are further broken down, into two ways — geographically and with states sized by number of electoral votes, a sort of boxy U.S. where California, Texas, New York and Florida are the largest boxes, correlating with the number of electoral votes they have. Users can scroll over an individual state and find out how many electoral votes it has and if it leans strongly Republican or Democrat. Scrolling over the geographic view produces the same effect.
Screenshot of Make Your Own Scenarios interactive map
There is also a Make Your Own Scenarios option on the page. But it is in fairly small font and may easily go unnoticed. Users can drag undecided states to vote for Obama or Romney and the electoral votes for the candidates adjust until a checkbox appears next to one candidate — signifying a win. This is quite an interactive graphic and allows users to really get involved with the numbers and information. A user’s scenario can even be shared on social media sites.
There is in-depth information listed below the maps for each state explaining how the state voted in 2008, how it affected President Obama and history of how the state voted.
Screenshot of The New York Times electoral number of votes
There is an incredibly large amount of information on this page and all electoral college maps. But the Times designs it very carefully. The typography is beautiful and easy to look at. For the graphic showing the number of votes a candidate needs to win, the number is the biggest part and the candidate’s name is off to the side in a smaller font, but still the subsequent biggest size because it is important to know which candidate, and then the actual number needed to win is off to the right in the smallest font. The design is calculated. It could easily be a mess, but it’s very clear and nice to look at. That’s typography and graphic design at its finest.
Huffington Post
The Huffington Post’s electoral map can be viewed geographically or as a cartogram — different sized circles signifying how many electoral votes a state has.
Under the map, there is a table that lists pollster outlooks and past results since 2000 state by state.
The Huffington Post’s take on the New York Times’ bar graph is that when the user scrolls over the electoral votes bar the individual state, its electoral votes and its political leaning is shown. The state is also highlighted on the map. Whereas the Times showed the overall numbers, not state by state.
For more information on individual states, users can click on the box that comes up on the bar graph. The HuffPost model is then shown as a line graph on a separate page and results from the latest polls are listed in a table.
Screenshot of Huffington Post recent changes graphic
A unique and helpful feature the Huffington Post offers is an update on recent changes to the map, shown graphically with a state that perhaps was once a tossup that changed to leaning a particular way. The date of the change and state involved is shown.
The Huffington Post also has an option for viewers to make their own map, by clicking on the states and changing the outcome. This is very effective interactivity. It uses people’s opinions as a way to get them involved in the news site.
The Washington Post
The Washington Post’s map is similar to the others. Users can choose to view the data in a geographic map or table, with current data or historical results. Under the map, there are explanations of the tossup states.
The Post delves deeper into data by providing information on the map for each state, including:
- unemployment
- income
- race
- if the state is urban or not
- if the state is solid or swing vote
- voter ID laws and gay marriage portrayal in the news.
A user can click on any of these categories and all states or one state for information. The Post is smart to include this in the electoral map because this is background information that often helps explain why states vote certain ways. The information is not overkill because users can choose to view it or not.
Screenshot of The Post’s information on the race for the House
The Post also provides tables and more information for the race for control of the Senate and House and governors’ race ratings. The other national news organizations did not supply this important information.
The Post also has a unique feature. There are two to three minute videos by “The Fix” to help users understand the complicated electoral map. This is a good way to offer different formats for users to understand. Graphs, tables and numbers are not effective for all. The Post is trying to reach all different kinds of readers.