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Hey there, I was involved in making these maps. You're absolutely correct. We used point data from BTS (http://www.rita.dot.gov/bts/sites/rita.dot.gov.bts/file

Hey there, I was involved in making these maps. You're absolutely correct. We used point data from BTS (http://www.rita.dot.gov/bts/sites/rita.dot.gov.bts/files/publications/national_transportation_atlas_database/2015/point http://www.rita.dot.gov/bts/sites/rita.dot.gov.bts/files/pub...), and did not filter out non-train station types. We're fixing this now.

knz 10y ago
I'm curious what software you and other media agencies use to make the maps (ESRI?) and how they manage their GIS data (any enterprise GIS software or just a bunch of shapefiles sitting on a network share)? Do they actively collect datasets or just pull it in as needed?
- lazarogamio 10y ago
  We use QGIS at the Post, which is open source. For organizing shapefiles, we don't really use anything fancy, just a shared folder. If we find something very useful, we put it in there.
  - knz 10y ago
    Awesome, it's great to see QGIS getting more popular. Thanks for the reply!
  - Cyph0n 10y ago
    QGIS is amazing to be frank. I'm glad it's working out for you guys!
    - lazarogamio 10y ago
      We love QGIS. Open source for life!
  - jimktrains2 10y ago
    Awesome you use OSS. I love QGIS and PostGIS!
    - knz 10y ago
      PostGIS is awesome. I was only exposed to ESRI at university (ArcIMS) and can still remember how I felt when someone told me I could have a world-class spatial engine for free. ESRI/ArcServer is just too expensive for smaller organisations especially once you add in the cost of licensing SQL Server or Oracle.
      - jimktrains2 10y ago
        > ESRI/ArcServer is just too expensive for smaller organisations especially once you add in the cost of licensing SQL Server or Oracle. I spent most of a year 2yrs ago trying to sell support for QGIS and PostGIS and GIS support in general to local municipalities but that died a very slow death as I had no idea how to sell to any government agency :(
        brightsize 10y ago
        Based on some arms-length interactions with the USGS, my impression is that they use ESRI stuff for basically everything spatial. Ditto for my city I think. The extent of the ESRI monopoly/entrenchment in government is maddening to me considering the licensing costs, the high quality of the open-source alternatives, and the fact that I'm footing the bill. When I was taking some GIS classes at a public university I wondered out loud if the classes would be about GIS or about "using ESRI products". When I inquired about having students learn to do the work with QGIS there was some hemming and hawing and "well we really don't know much about open source tools" and I got handed an install image of ArcGIS. I feel like I paid about 1/2 of my tuition to learn GIS fundamentals and the other 1/2 to pay for training on ESRI products.
        jimktrains2 10y ago
        Most places don't have anything, they make requests through their engineer and have no access to the data themselves. I also wanted to consolidate things like property records. But yeah, everyone who had a set up was ESRI :( Arc works with PostGIS, supposedly.
- sarcher 10y ago
  I also would be interested in how people organize vector datasets. Between GRASS, shapefiles, postgres, and geojson files (the four types of file storage I utilize most often) I find keeping organized to require an unusual amount of effort. I've looked into CKAN for datasets I want to share, but haven't taken the leap yet and wonder if it will just add to the complexity instead of reducing it.
ekun 10y ago
Why is there no nuclear in the power plant maps?
- enraged_camel 10y ago
  I'm wondering this as well. Is there no data available, or was it a political/editorial decision?
  - apaprocki 10y ago
    FWIW on the Bloomberg Terminal all these types of infrastructure can be played with as interactive map layers. Nuclear, refineries, pipelines, etc., so the data is definitely available and not "secret" by any means.
    - maxerickson 10y ago
      Yeah, the Energy Information Agency publishes their locations: http://www.eia.gov/state/maps.cfm http://www.eia.gov/state/maps.cfm There's a layer there for Nuclear plants too, so it is easy to adjust the map to only show them.
  - throwanem 10y ago
    Wikipedia doesn't seem to have trouble showing their locations, and there are a hundred of them currently in operation, producing just shy of a fifth of our country's electrical power. Given those facts, it is a curious omission, to say the least.
    - acidburnNSA 10y ago
      Seriously. Nuclear plants make up 60% of the US' carbon free electricity and (as you say) 20% of its generated electricity. Very curious omission indeed.
- sathackr 10y ago
  Maybe security? Because if we publish maps of nuclear power plants people might use them to get the bomb? Not that I agree with that. A simple Google search would be sufficient for someone just looking for a location.
sachinag 10y ago
In case you plan on updating these, I would love love love an overlay to add in state lines. For example, it appears that it would be technically possible to run a train from my hometown of Carbondale, IL to Saint Louis (blows my mind that it's not a thing) but putting in the overlay and being able to zoom and pretend make that route would be awesome.
- sarcher 10y ago
  This can be prototyped pretty quickly using Leaflet to serve the zoom-able tile map and topojson to reduce the size of the overlay data (in this case, train tracks and stations). I haven't tried topojson for a map of the lower 48, but I was getting a 80% reduction in data file size when using it on parcel data. This way, instead of rolling your own tile layer with the data which is a little bit of an involved process, you can just load a topojson file with the data and draw it as a vector layer. I'm sure there are limitations that make this much more difficult than I'm expressing due to the volume of traffic that hits washingtonpost.com - I'm more remarking on this so if other people are looking to do data visualizations like this they know there is a good dynamic option out there they can try. http://leafletjs.com/ http://leafletjs.com/ https://github.com/topojson/topojson https://github.com/topojson/topojson

knz 10y ago

I'm curious what software you and other media agencies use to make the maps (ESRI?) and how they manage their GIS data (any enterprise GIS software or just a bunch of shapefiles sitting on a network share)? Do they actively collect datasets or just pull it in as needed?

lazarogamio 10y ago
We use QGIS at the Post, which is open source. For organizing shapefiles, we don't really use anything fancy, just a shared folder. If we find something very useful, we put it in there.
- knz 10y ago
  Awesome, it's great to see QGIS getting more popular. Thanks for the reply!
- Cyph0n 10y ago
  QGIS is amazing to be frank. I'm glad it's working out for you guys!
  - lazarogamio 10y ago
    We love QGIS. Open source for life!
- jimktrains2 10y ago
  Awesome you use OSS. I love QGIS and PostGIS!
  - knz 10y ago
    PostGIS is awesome. I was only exposed to ESRI at university (ArcIMS) and can still remember how I felt when someone told me I could have a world-class spatial engine for free. ESRI/ArcServer is just too expensive for smaller organisations especially once you add in the cost of licensing SQL Server or Oracle.
    - jimktrains2 10y ago
      > ESRI/ArcServer is just too expensive for smaller organisations especially once you add in the cost of licensing SQL Server or Oracle. I spent most of a year 2yrs ago trying to sell support for QGIS and PostGIS and GIS support in general to local municipalities but that died a very slow death as I had no idea how to sell to any government agency :(
      - brightsize 10y ago
        Based on some arms-length interactions with the USGS, my impression is that they use ESRI stuff for basically everything spatial. Ditto for my city I think. The extent of the ESRI monopoly/entrenchment in government is maddening to me considering the licensing costs, the high quality of the open-source alternatives, and the fact that I'm footing the bill. When I was taking some GIS classes at a public university I wondered out loud if the classes would be about GIS or about "using ESRI products". When I inquired about having students learn to do the work with QGIS there was some hemming and hawing and "well we really don't know much about open source tools" and I got handed an install image of ArcGIS. I feel like I paid about 1/2 of my tuition to learn GIS fundamentals and the other 1/2 to pay for training on ESRI products.
        jimktrains2 10y ago
        Most places don't have anything, they make requests through their engineer and have no access to the data themselves. I also wanted to consolidate things like property records. But yeah, everyone who had a set up was ESRI :( Arc works with PostGIS, supposedly.
sarcher 10y ago
I also would be interested in how people organize vector datasets. Between GRASS, shapefiles, postgres, and geojson files (the four types of file storage I utilize most often) I find keeping organized to require an unusual amount of effort. I've looked into CKAN for datasets I want to share, but haven't taken the leap yet and wonder if it will just add to the complexity instead of reducing it.

ekun 10y ago

Why is there no nuclear in the power plant maps?

enraged_camel 10y ago
I'm wondering this as well. Is there no data available, or was it a political/editorial decision?
- apaprocki 10y ago
  FWIW on the Bloomberg Terminal all these types of infrastructure can be played with as interactive map layers. Nuclear, refineries, pipelines, etc., so the data is definitely available and not "secret" by any means.
  - maxerickson 10y ago
    Yeah, the Energy Information Agency publishes their locations: http://www.eia.gov/state/maps.cfm http://www.eia.gov/state/maps.cfm There's a layer there for Nuclear plants too, so it is easy to adjust the map to only show them.
- throwanem 10y ago
  Wikipedia doesn't seem to have trouble showing their locations, and there are a hundred of them currently in operation, producing just shy of a fifth of our country's electrical power. Given those facts, it is a curious omission, to say the least.
  - acidburnNSA 10y ago
    Seriously. Nuclear plants make up 60% of the US' carbon free electricity and (as you say) 20% of its generated electricity. Very curious omission indeed.
sathackr 10y ago
Maybe security? Because if we publish maps of nuclear power plants people might use them to get the bomb? Not that I agree with that. A simple Google search would be sufficient for someone just looking for a location.

sachinag 10y ago

In case you plan on updating these, I would love love love an overlay to add in state lines. For example, it appears that it would be technically possible to run a train from my hometown of Carbondale, IL to Saint Louis (blows my mind that it's not a thing) but putting in the overlay and being able to zoom and pretend make that route would be awesome.

sarcher 10y ago
This can be prototyped pretty quickly using Leaflet to serve the zoom-able tile map and topojson to reduce the size of the overlay data (in this case, train tracks and stations). I haven't tried topojson for a map of the lower 48, but I was getting a 80% reduction in data file size when using it on parcel data. This way, instead of rolling your own tile layer with the data which is a little bit of an involved process, you can just load a topojson file with the data and draw it as a vector layer. I'm sure there are limitations that make this much more difficult than I'm expressing due to the volume of traffic that hits washingtonpost.com - I'm more remarking on this so if other people are looking to do data visualizations like this they know there is a good dynamic option out there they can try. http://leafletjs.com/ http://leafletjs.com/ https://github.com/topojson/topojson https://github.com/topojson/topojson