A method for obtaining geographic information of a moving platform, the method comprising the procedures of: retrieving geographic information relating to a selected location of the moving platform in a geographical area, by extracting at least one geographic attribute at the selected location from a map data structure , characterized in that the map data structure is encoded from a map data representation of the geographical area by generating an attribute layer for each geographic attribute according to a defined line pattern and line width, and defining a bit-array of fixed bit-length for each grid element of a grid representing spatial coordinates of the geographical area, wherein generating an attribute layer comprises: assigning a color value for displaying the respective geographic attribute of the attribute layer; and assigning a priority value designating an order for decoding the attribute layers of the grid element, and wherein each bit of at least a portion of the bit array is associated with at least one respective attribute layer , by assigning a bit value of "1" if the respective geographic attribute is present at the respective location of the grid element , and assigning a bit value of "0" if the respective geographic attribute is absent at the respective location of the grid element , such that the binary value of the bit array provides an indication of the geographic attributes at the respective location of the grid element ; and the method further comprising the procedure of generating and displaying a map image depicting selected geographic attributes at the selected location of the moving platform, by sequentially scanning each bit in the bit-array of a grid element in order of priority, for each grid element of the selected location, and if the bit value of the scanned bit is "1" and the geographic attribute associated with the bit is selected, then displaying the geographic attribute according to the assigned color and the assigned priority. retrieving geographic information relating to a selected location of the moving platform in a geographical area, by extracting at least one geographic attribute at the selected location from a map data structure , characterized in that the map data structure is encoded from a map data representation of the geographical area by generating an attribute layer for each geographic attribute according to a defined line pattern and line width, and defining a bit-array of fixed bit-length for each grid element of a grid representing spatial coordinates of the geographical area, wherein generating an attribute layer comprises: assigning a color value for displaying the respective geographic attribute of the attribute layer; and assigning a priority value designating an order for decoding the attribute layers of the grid element, and wherein each bit of at least a portion of the bit array is associated with at least one respective attribute layer , by assigning a bit value of "1" if the respective geographic attribute is present at the respective location of the grid element , and assigning a bit value of "0" if the respective geographic attribute is absent at the respective location of the grid element , such that the binary value of the bit array provides an indication of the geographic attributes at the respective location of the grid element ; and the method further comprising the procedure of generating and displaying a map image depicting selected geographic attributes at the selected location of the moving platform, by sequentially scanning each bit in the bit-array of a grid element in order of priority, for each grid element of the selected location, and if the bit value of the scanned bit is "1" and the geographic attribute associated with the bit is selected, then displaying the geographic attribute according to the assigned color and the assigned priority. <EOS>