The map was created using genuine data and explores the idiom "All roads lead to Rome," its makers say. However ...
It's more accurately described as a "data visualization" or "infographic," since it is not a genuine road map.
The image was created using genuine data, but is described by its creators as a “data visualization project that explores the idiom, ‘all roads lead to Rome.’” It’s an infographic “art-data,” not a genuine road map.
The proverb "All roads lead to Rome" is said to have originated in relation to the Roman monument known as the Milliarium Aureum, or golden milestone. Erected by Caesar, the point was said to be at the center from which all distances in the Roman Empire were measured.
In the 21st century, the old adage was revamped when a graphic began circulating in 2015 that claimed to show how all roads still, in a sense, lead to Rome in the modern era.
One such iteration was shared again to X on Aug. 6, 2024. At the time of this publication, the image had received more than 62.6 million views.
While the image shown above was created in 2015 using genuine data, its creators describe it as a "data visualization project that explores the idiom, 'all roads lead to Rome.'" In other words, the image is better described as an infographic or "data art," not a genuine road map.
For these reasons, we have rated this claim as a "Mixture."
Snopes traced the map to a website published by Philipp Schmitt, an artist and designer, on which he describes the map as having been made with antidisciplinary designer Benedikt Groß. The map was made while the two were at the former research facility moovel Lab.
In a December 2015 post, Groß described the project as follows:
The outcome is both information visualization and data art and unveils mobility patterns at a very large scale. The visualizations were created using routing algorithms on existing street infrastructure from the city to continent scale. The resulting images bring insights into the ways in which road infrastructure reflect regional, political and geographical situations.
The project is a thought experiment that shows nearly half a million ways a person could get to Rome from major Western European cities.
Though the project website is no longer online, an archived version from January 2021 is available through the Wayback Machine.
To begin, the team aligned starting points in a more than 10-million-square-mile grid covering all of Europe. Each cell in the grid contained a starting point to one of the team's "journeys to Rome."
There are then 486,713 starting points to reach Rome. So, the team created an algorithm that calculated one route leading to Rome for every analyzed European starting point. The team wrote:
The calculation and presentation of these different routes is based on different pieces of open source software. GraphHopper was our central tool for routing our journeys. In total GraphHopper ran 20 hours while calculating all the routes displayed on the maps. GraphHopper works with Open Street Map data, which has also been essential for our project. The calculation and presentation of these different routes is based on different pieces of open source software. GraphHopper was our central tool for routing our journeys. In total GraphHopper ran 20 hours while caluculating all routes displayed on the maps. GraphHopper works with Open Street Map data, which has also been essetial for our project.
At the time of the project in 2015, it took GraphHopper on the team's MacPro more than five hours to calculate the more than 400,000 European routes to Rome.
"The maps as an outcome of this project are somewhere between information visualization and data art, unveiling mobility at a very large scale," wrote the team.
Hayley Drennon, a senior research assistant at Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory who is not affiliated with the project, further confirmed that the image is based on "an algorithm that highlights all roads leading to a point."
Drennon likens the map to "six degrees from Kevin Bacon" or "Bacon's Law," a concept based on the notion that everyone in the world is connected by six or fewer acquaintances.
"Any large metropolitan city will have major roads coming into it. We can also say that 'all roads lead to Paris' or 'every road in America leads to Atlanta," Drennon told Snopes. "Because, let's be honest, roads are like a circulatory system."
The Rome map was presented at the 2016 IEEE Visualization Conference, an annual gathering on scientific visualization, information visualization, and visual analytics administrated by the IEEE Computer Society Technical Committee on Visualization and Graphics. Map creators Groß, Schmitt, and Raphael Reimann are listed on page 18 of the conference agenda.
Snopes also found a project description (full text visible here) submitted to the 2016 IEEE VIS conference with more information about the project. Its abstract read:
The proverb 'all roads lead to Rome' is, by a closer look, a very interesting suggestive mobility statement. The goal of the 'Roads to Rome' was to find an automated way to visualize this saying. During the process of finding the right methods and approaches the authors encountered several inspiring further threads of ideas. The authors created maps using algorithms for routing from multiple starts to a single destination and also multiple destinations. The researchers also used the developed methodology on a small scale to visualize mobility network diagrams of selected cities. The resulting images are not only visually intriguing, but also allow conclusions about how road infrastructure reflects regional, political and geographical situations.
In the project description, the authors refer to the maps as "data art" used to "incorporate the aesthetics of art while basing on the principles of real world routing and large scale data processing."
In other words, the project goal was to "find an automated way to visualize the proverb," all roads lead to Rome.
The team concludes its work with a disclaimer:
The different maps and figures being the result of 'Roads to Rome' show how mobility at scale can be visualized. Keeping in mind, that this project is a borderline case of 'data-art' it does allow interpretations, but should be handled with care when making decisions needing hard proof for example in infrastructure planning. Nevertheless, since closely connected to real datasets it can be seen as a great entry point for mobility discussions, especially concerning street networks, politics and geography.
Collectively, the Rome map – as well as those made by the team to depict other European and American cities – show how mobility at scale can be visualized.
(Groß, Schmitt, Reimann )