new jersey geographer » Google Maps http://njgeo.org john reiser's personal/gis blog Thu, 29 Jul 2010 02:50:09 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0.1 Release of “Changing Landscapes in the Garden State” http://njgeo.org/2010/07/28/release-of-changing-landscapes-in-the-garden-state/ http://njgeo.org/2010/07/28/release-of-changing-landscapes-in-the-garden-state/#comments Thu, 29 Jul 2010 02:50:09 +0000 John Reiser http://njgeo.org/?p=346 animation of the progression of urban developmentJohn Hasse and Richard Lathrop have been studying land use change in New Jersey since 2002. Their previous reports have been the impetus of many discussions on urban sprawl, environmental protection and resource planning in New Jersey. The reports themselves were released shortly after NJ DEP released their updates to the statewide land use/land cover data. This data set covers 1986, 1995, 2002 and released just one month ago, 2007. Over the past month, I’ve been working on the report’s website, hosted at Rowan on our GIS server. The last month has literally been a blur as we’ve worked to get the data for the report together and then into a series of interactive, animated web maps that show the progression of urban change over 21 years. Over the next few days, I’ll be posting a series on the project, from inception through implementation to release. I feel proud at my accomplishment – within one month I managed to prepare all the data, render and store it on Amazon Web Services, and develop a simple framework for animating a tile-based web map. I hope to be able to detail the process so that others may be able to do the same. If you have not done so already, please check out the report’s website and leave feedback and questions in the comments below. I’ll try to answer any questions about the projects in the subsequent posts.

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]]> http://njgeo.org/2010/07/28/release-of-changing-landscapes-in-the-garden-state/feed/ 1 40.220623530888 -74.769891500473 Google Latitude now with badge, basic API http://njgeo.org/2009/05/05/google-latitude-now-with-badge-basic-api/ http://njgeo.org/2009/05/05/google-latitude-now-with-badge-basic-api/#comments Wed, 06 May 2009 02:23:58 +0000 John Reiser http://njgeo.org/?p=162 Google Latitude has been updated to incorporate new features that make it easier to share your location data. A website badge has been created that shows your most recent position on a web page. You can see an example of the badge showing my current location on this blog’s home page, as well as on the home page of NJ State Atlas. Google has also introduced a basic API allowing you to retrieve your location information as KML or GeoJSON.

Considering someone will likely (ab)use these new features soon, I’m starting a countdown. I’m guessing a week from now we’ll hear about how someone tracked someone unknowingly using a Latitude-enabled mobile device and the API. Personally, I’m hoping the API gets put to good use and is integrated into some groundbreaking projects.

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]]> http://njgeo.org/2009/05/05/google-latitude-now-with-badge-basic-api/feed/ 1 The Advent of All-knowing Point Maps http://njgeo.org/2009/04/20/the-advent-of-all-knowing-point-maps/ http://njgeo.org/2009/04/20/the-advent-of-all-knowing-point-maps/#comments Tue, 21 Apr 2009 03:45:50 +0000 John Reiser http://njgeo.org/?p=141 Over on MetaFilter today, there is a great post filled with links to interactive maps detailing various aspects of the recession and the eventual rebound in the economy. In looking through these maps, I’m irked by the cartographic conventions employed by some of them. Google Maps has started a dangerous trend: representing everything possible as a point on a map.

For example, take Richard Florida’s “The Shaping of America” interactive map in The Atlantic. The map relies on points of varying size to show the number of patents, the population and income levels for selected US cities. The size and color of the point is an indicator of the city’s performance relative to the surrounding “metro average.” There’s no definition of what these “metro areas” are. They are not delineated on the map. The boundaries of the city are also not reflected.

Why is this a problem? While not having the city outlined is concerning, the truly egregious flaw is that the theme of the map is dependent on a ratio without well-defined boundaries. Take, for instance, Trenton, New Jersey. Trenton is slightly north of the geographic center of New Jersey, however it is routinely grouped with “South Jersey” and is rarely grouped in “Central Jersey.” The parts of the State that identify themselves as “Trenton Metro” are limited to adjacent municipalities, if that. So what is the “metro area” of Trenton? Is Princeton included in Trenton? That would absolutely set Trenton above average for all three indicators mapped.

Map depicting a few of the boundaries for Trenton and its Metro Area

Map depicting just a few of the boundaries for Trenton, NJ

Now consider the New York Times Immigration Explorer. The Times has been cranking out some amazing maps lately and this one is no exception. This temporal, thematic map is rendered using Flash. It shows the 3,000 or so counties within the US with great detail and clarity. Ethic groups as a percentage of total population are reflected on a chloropleth map while the overall population is shown using dots of varying size. We’re back to the dot map, but it’s very different from the Google Dot Map above. The dots are sized in proportion to the total population, not an ill-defined sample. Also, the Flash interface allows the user to manipulate the base size of the dots, which allows the user to discern differences in population in the most sparsely inhabited regions.

Immigration Explorer would still convey its intended message if the cartographers behind it employed a dot map like the Shaping of America. Considering the data is explicitly by county, a point map could be used without introducing ambiguity. However, considering the geographies represented by the Shaping of America map are not well-defined, we are left guessing what we’re actually trying to represent with those dots.

Google Maps (and KML, the language for user-defined data in Google Earth) supports lines and polygons. Granted, there are more hoops to jump through to get vector data into Google Maps, but there are ways to do it. Maps that really require representation using polygons should not be constructed using points & Google Maps. Using Google Maps isn’t what’s important. Making sure your map delivers its intended message is essential.

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