OCCUPATION: CARTOGRAPHER

Name: Donald G. Simmons

Company: Thomas Bros. Maps

Thumbs up: “I like working with maps. I like taking things that are real-life and reproducing them on paper. It’s creative and artistic. I get a chance to make some cartographic decisions, such as plotting new streets using source information derived from aerial photographs, tract and parcel maps.”

Thumbs down: “The only thing I dislike is not having enough backup source information. For instance, if someone tells me a street exists in a certain city, I like to have another source. But that’s when you have to use your cartographic sense.”

Next step: “There are quite a number of atlases that need to be updated, and that’s a long-range plan.”

Advice:”Go to school and take some geography courses. That would be the way to get into cartography.”

Salary range: In Orange County, the range is from $1,040 to $5,948 monthly.

Fringe benefits: Retirement, paid sick leave, vacation, medical, dental, life and vision insurance.

Hours: 40-hour, five-day workweeks.

Educational and training requirements: High school diploma, plus two to four years of college courses in geology, geography, drafting, mathematics, or related fields or five years cartography-related work experience.

Size of work force: Small. In Orange County, about 75 people work as cartographers.

Expected demand: Says Tom Lennon, cartography supervisor at Thomas Bros. Maps: “The trend in California seems to be slow growth, so the demand for cartographers is not very high, and I don’t see it going up very much. But there is a steady demand--county and city governments need them all the time.”

Job description: Update atlases and street maps with new street information, maintain cartographic databases.

Major employing industries: Commercial map-making firms; automobile clubs; government agencies, including police, fire, water, forestry and defense departments; large engineering, surveying, transportation, development and construction firms.

For more information: Call or write the American Congress of Surveying and Mapping, 5410 Grosvner Lane, Bethesda, Md., 20814. (301) 493-0200.