Open data for New York
We searched in internet and we found different sources of data. Once we have all the data we have decided which data we wanted to display in order to support the idea and aim of the project.
We decided to display four main groups of data sets:
- Transit: public transportation services in the city of New York
- Bike lanes Let's try thin green lines for bike lanes (dashed?)
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Zoning : display the different land uses of the the city. We split the zoning in four different zones
- Residential
- Manufacturing
- Parks
- Commercial
- Flood zones
All the data we decided to work with were shape files and to manipulate and play with the data we used QGIS. As the data came from different datasources we had to deal with CRS problems. As the data had different geometries we had to decided how we wanted to display and generate the shapefiles to be shown on the live map.
Once we downloaded and decided all the data we wanted to display the next step was to decided HOW we want to display the data in order to put across the goal of the project.
To display layers like transit and bike lines we just decided to pick a color for each of the type of types to distinguish everything. We decided to use blue for bus stops and bus routes, red for train lines and subway stations entrances and green for bike lanes.
As the zoning data set allows us to distinguish different types of data within the same category we have discussed and decide WHAT we wanted to display.
The category "residential" had 10 different grades which from less to more define the density of population. In order to pass on the equal distributed values we decided to use a blue gradient color from light blue to dark blue to distinguish the 10 different densities of population. So, in this case, data shown as darkest blue will be most density populated and opposite for the light blue areas.
Because we are not interested in the type of Commercial areas, we decided to use the same color for all the data and we picked the yellow.
Same case for Parks, which also includes green spaces and areas not only parks.
On the other hand, we wanted to put more emphasis in manufacturing areas. Following the this criteria and we decided to display this category in three different subgroups. As we want to emphasize that the pollution is not good, we decided to distinguish three different areas using red range color representing the most polluted area as dark red and less polluted areas will be displayed with light reds.
We generate data for for all the layers mentioned. Different ideas where on the table to generate the final finales to be downloaded to the server. We finally decided the best way to do this was to created a shapefile for each of the layers and SLD (style file). Once we got this file we uploaded to GeoServer and it will provide the data in PNG format to be displayed as WMS on the mapseed project.
How the live version looks like link
