Recently, I was thrown into map projection issue and this
pushed me to my technical limit. For this article, I will not reveal the full
context of the area it happened due to privacy reasons. I was tasked to identify
the locations of new road intersections, geometries and other road aspects for
new housing subdivision. This task is important as the organization needs to
submit these new roads information to state government in a particular format
(not in GIS format).
The reason this task became a map projection issue is
because the drawing file that was supplied to me had a projection that was
unknown to me. The organization contracted an external party who surveyed the
locations of the new roads. The projection they used was customized UTM for the
subdivision area. Originally, when the drawing file was supplied, the projection
parameter was not visible in QGIS. For this work, I had ArcGIS and QGIS only
and no FME or any other projection converter to help.
I approached the organization to supply the coordinate
system that is attached to the drawing file. I stumbled upon a projection (let’s
call it Projection A) that I have not encountered before. Fortunately, the
organization supplied the parameters that is needed for ArcGIS/QGIS to
visualize the line works.
Having said, I need to match the location of these new roads
with the organization’s existing road network. Having no experience about
Projection A, I made an attempt to do direct projection conversion from
Projection A to one of the MGA zones (where the subdivision is located). The
outcome was not desirable as the subdivision was positioned in the sea! After
making some futile attempts to convert, I gave up on my own approach.
The following day, I contacted the state roads department on
the projection A parameters and conversion process. The person who manages the
section was kind enough to spend her time to walking the process. I had to de-project
Projection A to GDA and reproject it back to MGA projection. Since I was use
ArcGIS for this process, I contacted one of my ESRI contacts on how to
implement this process in ArcMap. He worked out the implementation process (he
was kind of puzzled by the name of the projection A).
I had a serious relook into projection parameters I
initially set in Projection A and corrected any inaccuracies. Following the
procedures outlined by state roads department and ESRI, I successfully brought
the new roads into alignment with existing road network. It was Momentous occasion
as it solved my riddle for past two days.
Below here is attached image of the new roads that pushed my
mental skills.
New roads of a new subdivision which aligned well with existing road network
Due to privacy reasons, the location of the roads, the name of the projection, organization and state road department are kept hidden.
Recently, I have been pushing myself to test my capability in generating high quality cartographic works in QGIS. Since I took on a mini project on Malaysian state of Kedah, this atlas was truly a combination of open source data and open source software.
For data in Malaysia, I manage to obtain through third party sources for district, subdistrict and voting locality boundaries. In Malaysia, these sorts of data are super hard to find (generally all forms of datasets for large scale maps of Malaysia are not for free). The roads, railways, rivers and land use data was sourced from Open Street Map (I recommend http://extract.bbbike.org/). Avoid choosing QGIS tool for Open Street Map as you get good coverage of the dataset with minimal attributes (making them redundant). The terrain is not exactly open source as it came from ASTER GDEM and hence, it restricts anyone to produce commercial maps.
The software I used was QGIS. In order to produce 200+ page atlas (based on sub district levels), I used Print Composer. It is the equivalent of Data Driven Pages in ArcGIS. I have made full use multi map concept where I can pinpoint the reader where they are (the inset maps). The legend size remains difficult thing to adjust (now I realized there is legend customization through filter) as it dominates a significant chunk of the map. The scale is tricky part and I resorted to numeric figure as QGIS hasn't improved on the variable scale legend. Now, I also realized there are better options to choose from for the North Arrows.
How about the map itself? I used pretty much standard colour schemes for every dataset for the atlas. Hillshading worked out very well for the Bandar Padang Mat Sirat and Bandar Yan (impressed with QGIS capability). Choosing the colour of roads required much judgment as the terrain colouring exerted its influence significantly. The text visibility has been controlled after much playing around and deliberation. The original dataset of roads showed many road segmentation, Using the blending option, I was able to show a full continuity for the highways.A lot of judgement was used to determine how many layers are relevant to the atlas and which ones need to be kicked out.
Below here are some examples of urban, semi-urban and rural settings of Kedah (viewed through maps). When the final product came out, I was impressed with QGIS capability. For more maps, please contact me here.
Speaker from Responsible Gambling Foundation (Victoria) on how QGIS is applied for assessing the proximity of pokies (gambling areas) and gamble help centres
On 14th May 2015, in the beautiful Crown Towers site, Digital Mapping Solutions (DMS) hosted a well-attended QGIS Forum. They brought city councils, companies and freelance cartographers together to listen about the progress in QGIS and its application in real scenarios. DMS is the forefront in advocating QGIS to many of its clients, active participant in QGIS development and conduct many training of QGIS. For those who don't know, QGIS (formerly Quantum GIS) is an open source GIS and increasingly adopted globally.
Despite being hosted in expensive Crown Towers (next to the Casino), DMS surprisingly hosted the morning session about QGIS with sumptuous breakfast for FREE! They are generous indeed especially the heavy breakfast! For this discussion, I will point out specific things you need to know about QGIS (which was discussed in the forum).
How can I submit an issue or feature request for QGIS? Proceed to the website here
How can I retain the layer file in QGIS? The .qlr file is the equivalent of ArcGIS layer file . Refer here
Group layers in QGIS. Refer to this YouTube link
You can import a CSV file containing a particular font setting which allows QGIS to customize the labeling based on the imported CSV.
How can I produce a map where the main focus stands out as a figure? Use Mask and watch this YouTube link :
In the print composer, you can add the raster image as background and use blending tool to adjust the visibility strength of raster image
How can I customize a legend that is only relevant to the map content? I would like to have the legend to show the layers visible on the map. Use the filter (in Legend). Refer here (Go to Legend Items)
Presets can control the number of map layers viewable and it is useful for the multimap concept in print composer. Refer here
QGIS is not just for desktop maps, it is also for publishing web based maps. Use qgis2leaf and read here for more details.
In the forum, we have seen the demonstration of city councils of utilizing custom forms in QGIS. Refer here on how to create QGIS custom forms
From the presentations, I have noted city council organizations have been slowly dropping off the commercial GIS software in favour of QGIS. This is because the councils would like to lower the software maintenance cost and cheaper GIS distribution within the organizations, However, before embarking such transitions, each organization must undergo fundamental training in QGIS.
I hope you find the 10 tips above allow you to explore more in depth the power of QGIS in various aspects.
The map above converts complex statistical information to chunks of relevant knowledge pieces
This is part of my submission to International Map Industry Association (IMIA) blog
Like many cartographers, I am always fascinated with maps. I could be staring at any floating globe or spending quality time with my atlases. Maps has been one of the best graphical tools to convey knowledge. Knowledge is Power. Hence, Map is Power too!
Through my personal globe and many atlases, I came to know the vastness and complexities of the world. Maps simplify the complexity of world into chunks of knowledge relevant for the audience. For example, atlases have many thematic maps which shows the interrelationships of nature and mankind. A thematic map reduces multiple relationships to a simpler one where you and I can understand the world. Since the dawn of mankind, maps has served to further progress of humanity. From finding food to 3D modelling of disasters, maps have informed us what to do. Hence, Map is Power!
Like what other blog contributors mentioned, most of the map history is dictated by the professional surveyors and cartographers. Vast majority of the populace lives by and accept the standards and shapes determined by map-makers. Hence, the power of maps and the knowledge conveyed to the world is predetermined. With the advent of technologies and global geographical volunteers, the centre of power has shifted away from the map-makers. Today, non-cartographers(or surveyors/GISers) are the forefront in providing the new geographical information and most importantly, new maps.
I captured a lot of free geographic information for many years but there wasn’t a platform for me to make it publicly available. Then, I stumbled upon the OpenStreetMap and it was Power in action. As I am from Malaysia, freely available datasets (we take granted this in developed world) is very hard to be obtained. OpenStreetMap provided me and other geographic volunteers to break down the mammoth dataset barrier in front of us. Before Google Maps showed all the bus stops locations of my home state, I filled up the bus stops and route paths on Open Street Maps. Other users also chipped in by updating the attributes. It is clear example how new technologies are bringing power of maps to a bigger audience. Maps impact people and people impact maps.
With the advent open source datasets and open source technologies, maps are empowering more people than ever. Civil society and individuals are creating maps more than ever in history of mankind and interpreting the world in their unique ways. Barriers are coming down and map mashups are everywhere. Geographical analysis is advancing further and giving new insights to businesses and governments. We know exactly where to put our store or next school. We can visualize predictions using time-lapse features of various GIS software. Don’t you feel map is so empowering? Map is Power.
In conclusion, in our current lifetime, we have seen how maps have empowered us. More importantly, we, both the consumers and producers, have been empowered to shape the maps. Maps will continue to evolve (from drawings on ground to virtual reality) but always to stick to its main purpose. Conveying knowledge in a simplified manner and giving us the power to act. Map is Power!
Danesh Prakash Chacko, volunteer/pro-bono GIS consultant in Melbourne (Australia)
Usually when I produce maps, I produce a single map based on single theme. However, back in my uni days and work training, I have learnt an important cartographic component in ArcGIS and QGIS.
A sample Local Government Area map of New South
Wales built on ArcGIS
It was about building an 'Atlas' in GIS. Multiple maps stored in one PDF and ready for print. This knowledge was put to the test when one of my Account Manager said he wants a map of all his clients (October 2014). His clients are spread over one state and he had a list of them in Excel. Good thing was they were Local Governments only.
In April 2015, another Account Manager approached me and asked me to produce a map of local governments and water authorities in New South Wales. You may think why do we need an Atlas style product for these two instances?
In this discussion, I will be discussing the challenges behind making these two 'atlases' and some comparisons between QGIS and ArcGIS.
Challenges/Issues to Consider
Data - In Australia, they have free data for Local Government Areas. However, the free data they had for the road network and localities are nearly 10 years old (Sourced from Geoscience Australia).
Intended Audience - Account Managers use these maps as rough guides where their clients and prospective ones are found. Sometimes they may use for rough planning when they traveling around to see multiple clients. Hence, just showing the local government areas (LGAs) is not enough. I cannot expect my audience to know every LGA by name and location. Due to that, I incorporated roads and localities to give good geographical insight
Level of Information Displayed - This becomes an issue on how many towns and cities the map should contain. If you refer to the first figure above, I classified the localities strictly to towns and cities. My Account Managers doesn't need to know every town or populated area in LGA. They need to know LGA name, the main town (s) and some roads connecting between towns.
Scale - The most difficult issue I faced. New South Wales has over hundred LGAs of varying size and it is impossible to have clean map with all names of LGA. That is why the concept of mapbook was used in these two instances. ArcGIS and QGIS uses one shapefile to break down the mapbook into regions. I used Tourist Regions to divide the various states in Australia to produce multiple maps. However, in the context of New South Wales, I felt Tourist Region is very general division. I chose Statistical regional divisions to show more zoomed-in views of Sydney area. Sydney has many smaller size (only area we talking about) LGAs.
Text Layout - Text is necessary evil. I have ZERO intention of using any other graphic software to beautify the map. I am producing the map on the go and would like to deliver fast to my Account Managers. I fully capitalized Maplex Label Engine (in ArcGIS) to position text at best.
Software - I have used mapbook approach twice (in real life situation) so far in my cartographic career. The first instance, I was motivated to use QGIS to produce mapbooks for many states. The second instance, I used ArcGIS as I have not used Data-Driven pages before.Both instances they were learning curves for me.
ArcGIS/QGIS
I was very much grounded to ArcGIS (the only GIS software I knew at university). I came to know QGIS through my current work and learned further through QGIS training. Some opinions:
In both GIS software, the final layout and content to be displayed are nearly the same. You can change the paper size, adjust the legends and placing inset maps in ArcGIS and QGIS
From my experience, time consumed from the collecting data to final output are nearly the same for both software.
However, the KEY difference between ArcGIS and QGIS I have noticed is the cartographic presentation. In ArcGIS, they have more in-built colour schemes than QGIS. Hence, I spend less time in determining on one of the fundamentals of maps. In text labeling, I was pleased both in performance by ArcGIS and QGIS
If you ask my stance, I tilt to ArcGIS due to my longer exposure comparatively to QGIS. However, the essence of this blog post is not about which software is better than other. In these two instances which used two different software, it is principles of mapping that played a big factor:
Who is my Audience?
How much information my Audience needs to see?
Is the datasets needed for the map readily available?
What scale level should I utilize? Should it be fixed or dynamic
What is the best position for the labels
Is the overall map layout conveys the right information the Audience needs to know?
Resources I used for building the map books using QGIS and ArcGIS
Presenter on Dominican Republic GIS (GeoRabble #6 Melbourne)
This week we will examine some key discussions of GIS or applications of GIS which I encountered this week
GeoRabble #6
Cramped in a dungeon style room in a bar, GeoRabble #6 is a hub of discussion, networking and exchange of GIS knowledge. Whether you are user, developer or owner of geospatial business, GeoRabble is a place to rabble about our love - GIS ! We had multiple presentations (no Sales Pitch!) in two hours - crisis leadership, Bushfire management, open data in Victoria, evolving Melbourne, UAVs and Application of GIS in Dominican Republic. All speakers covered a great deal of material, the challenges and success of the GIS applications. For this blog post, we focus on two:
Dominican Republic
After listening to many presentations, 100% of the presentation were purely focusing on Melbourne and Victoria (nothing wrong but we need to expand our minds). I wanted to hear something international and we had one! The speaker is senior consultant and signed up for Australian Aid Volunteers program (a Australian federal program of sending professional and technical volunteers to developing program.
When she saw the opportunity, she met the language and technical requirements needed for the volunteer. She was posted to one year in Dominican Republic for GIS implementation in Emergency Management. Dominican Republic is subjected to multiple hurricanes, tropical storms and earthquakes (let's remind ourselves of Haitian earthquake in 2010).
Her assignment was to coordinate and establish a multi-agency geospatial team for disaster management (EIGEO). It was built under the recommendation from United Nations. The purpose of EIGEO is to gather, store and produce information for Emergency Commission (Dominican Republic)
First challenges she faced:
Difficulty in obtaining GIS data or outdated GIS data
No trained GIS staff
Uncoordinated GIS activities and lack of sharing of data among government agencies
Politicized environment which acts as an impediment for data sharing
Work culture which is very different to Australia
Process of setting up EIGEO:
Creation of National Information Systems for Disaster Management
Built on Open GIS tools
Identify and follow-up on dataset gathering
Building a system
Activation and response during Emergency
Create a GIS crisis team
Developing protocols in emergency response
Training in QGIS, radar interpretation and other geospatial aspects
Collection and organizing the data
Identifying gaps in the datasets
Spatial analysis such as hydrological analysis (since hurricanes and tropical storms do affect the Republic)
Seeking support from international organization
The biggest challenge identified:
Sustainability of the project. The concern is whether EIGEO and the project itself will continue in light of cutbacks of Australian aid budget
Changing Melbourne
The final presenter is a GIS analyst within urban planning company. His presentation was pulling publicly available 1945 imagery of Melbourne and overlaying with current imagery using Mapbox (his personal initiative). Basically, we got the chance to see the huge changes between post-war and current Mellbourne. The link is here.
Some quick overview changes we saw:
Significant American military presence in Melbourne in 1945. Today, most areas has been converted to industrial or residential areas
Former farm and orchard areas in Melbourne fringes have been converted to massive housing estates and Melbourne International Airport (Tullamarine)
My company organize biennial conferences to bring our clients and partners to discuss and learn where our software is heading too. Although the focus is heavily on asset management and how the software are capable of solving your needs, GIS is not ignored in anyway. Part of the conference itinerary was an inspirational speech by Saroo Brierley.
Some of us has watched the brief story of Saroo. He was invited to our conference to present his story - the quest to see his long-lost family back in India. More importantly, the way he found his family was through memory maps and Google Earth. Hence, mapping(!) is so critical in removing the burden in his shoulder- where is his family.
Saroo and how Google Earth helped in his family search
He got lost in a train to Calcutta (Kolkata) and he was adopted temporarily in orphanage. He was subsequently adopted by Tasmanian family and offering him the love and the family he lost. As he grew older, he had a burning desire to find his family. Using his photographic memory of landmarks of his suburb and his train journey, he began to search in atlases where his family resides. As time proceeded, Google Earth began to help him though internet (up to 2011) was very slow. With advent of broadband internet, he began to ramp up his efforts in tracing exactly where the village was.
Finally, one morning, he received a big surprise. He has nailed his area in Google Earth and found the name of the town. He contacted the FB administrator of town to verify the name of his birth area. After receiving correction, he organized flight to India. He arrived in his town, struggled a bit to find his old home and he wasn't sure whether he was in the right town. Finally, after talking to locals, he found his old home and met his mother for the first time in 20+ years! It was an emotional story for the audience who were listening
Location Analytics
A senior ESRI Business Manager spoke at the conference the importance on leveraging location in areas of asset management. ESRI has a vision of enterprise collaboration and encouraging data sharing within the clients.
She stressed that location is very important aspect in our lives. More so, the next 5 billion internet users may no longer use desktop PC to access internet. Hence, the organizations like councils and ESRI need to build scaleable apps to accommodate the new need and approach to internet.
She mentioned in Australia up to 67% of the population use smartphone, nearly 15 million internet users and each Australian (those who access internet) use up to 3 devices to access internet. Plus, commercialisation of IT meant our home internet experience will brought across to our work places. Hence, we need scaleable apps
ESRI presenter on ArcGIS online and integration with predictive conditions of roads
She stressed once more than spatial data is critical for organizations and government functions. Maps are vital for our progress and no longer under pure GIS/geography domain. She also demonstrated how ArcGIS Online helped the local government to visualize the road conditions in the next 10 years.
This post is not about learning or understanding something new. However, this short post is warning to my friends (or readers) who are studying architecture, civil engineers, urban planners and environmental engineer. All of you would undertake one or two short courses on GIS and surveying.
Sample survey plan from New Zealand (not related to client site)
Recently a friend of mine asked me two separate questions on surveying. First, he was asking about backsight and foresight (leveling). I have distanced away from surveying for past three years. Basically, he was asking to clarify Rise and Fall Method. I did quick internet search and mentioned to my friend there are some important principles.
Rise and Fall Method is one of the ways to transfer heights from one fixed point to multiple points. This process is called leveling. A surveyor start out at fixed permanent datum (height) and carrying the heights along a distance (of selected points). It is important procedure in construction works.
To learn more about Rise and Fall method, read here
If you read the article above, the important principles in this method are:
the difference between the sum of the rises and the sum of the falls, and
the difference between the first and the final R.L. or vice versa.
The second matter of surveying got bit complicated. My friend had to compile a survey request and scout out a suitable quotation. A feature survey for a future development site. First question I got asked is what is feature survey? Personally I was unsure what is it all about and I thought it included cadastral boundaries. I quickly checked with my professional surveyor contact what exactly is feature survey. There were three types of feature surveys (from purely locating things to complete boundary determination). He recommended to me that it is best my friend to discuss directly with a surveying firm,
I assisted my friend in writing a simple survey request for quotation which included dimensions and other engineering features to be identified. Now, my friend got some quotes and we leave it here which surveying firm will be chosen.
The points here:
If you are town planner, architecture, civil engineer or environmental scientists, never, never forget what you learnt in surveying and GIS. It will haunt in your career
Especially when it comes to surveying, if you are unsure about definitions, it is best to direct your client/affected friend to the surveying firm. Surveying covers legal matter and hence, as a GIS professional, you just need to exercise caution when advising.
