I always heard that practice makes a man perfect but now I finally believe in it while working on my final project. For every new function and tool I learned in class, I wondered how helpful they are and how easier the map making will be with them. Now, while working on my project I can realize that there is a big difference in just knowing tools and actually using them and working with them. Very basic functions like joining attributes, labeling, symbolizing, etc. can take hours and hours. Another thing I noted is that the process of collecting the raw data for making a map is more challenging task than actual process of making the map. In the beginners’ class making maps from provided processed data feels like “cake walk” but now I certainly feel the amount of the work that needs to be put in for finding that data.
The more error you get the more you learn. And to get more errors you have to keep playing with keys. I hope after making hundreds of thousands maps I will be a perfect map maker!
Lately, in my GIS classes, I have been working on ArcScene. I am really impressed with its animation tool. Animated map is undoubtedly superior to a plain map on screen or paper. With map animation, we can easily show spatial and temporal changes.
While there are numerous examples of animated map you can find on web, here is one I like to share with you. This is a short video showing American History-Growth of a Nation. Narration and animation gives a different dimension to the maps. Enjoy the video!
I think it is time to post some core theories- Central place theory (CPT) and Voronoi diagram. So be ready to give your brain quite an exercise!
Originally developed by Walter Christaller in 1933, Central place theory is the idea that urban locations are arranged spatially in a pattern of hexagons that are nested based on the size of the urban location. Rather explaining whole theory, I like to put in front of you a short video summarizing the concept.
This concept has been called Unrealistic. However, it is able to imitate existing urban system (i.e by applying K=3, K=4, and K=7 method). CPT attempts to illustrate how settlements locate in relation to one another, the amount of market area a central place can control, and why some central places function as hamlets, villages, towns, or cities.
It is also one of the most widely studied models of retail location and market area patterns.
While the CPT is a concept on spatial- temporal relationship, the Voronoi Adjacency graph could be valuable tools for the manipulation of spatial adjacency relationship in a computer environment for a variety of application.
One of the articles I had studied few years back illustrated retail location and market area pattern by using higher-order Voronoi diagrams. These diagrams construct market areas based on the assumption that consumers choose from a set of k (where k = 1 to n number) nearest centers of the same hierarchical level. The appropriate market areas are given by the order-k Voronoi design. If I am remembering it right, it is the article named ‘Relaxing the nearest centre assumption in central place theory’.
Here is the Voronoi-Style US Maps with a current location of state capitals and simulated new boundaries constructed so that every place within the polygon is nearest to its capital city. (special thanks to my friend Kristi who cared to find these great maps in the first place. Here is Kristi's Posts - "Voronoi Diagramming and GIS" and "Voronoi II")
(Unchanged map)
(Voronoi-style map with new boundaries)
(Map with current political state boundaries overlaped with Voronoi-style boundaries)
