Usability questions/Not quite sure how to interpret the maps

[Rich Brown]

This is a very cool project. I just found it the other day, and if I am interpreting it properly, it presents quite interesting data. But that's partly the problem: I can't be sure about what it's showing me. Some comments:

1) I think the About page needs a new paragraph (perhaps after the first) something like, "These maps show a measure street interconnectedness using our "sprawl index". Highly connected streets have blue backgrounds, while redder backgrounds indicate less connected areas..." (and maybe a little more - is it a measure of housing or development sprawl? Are there other insights to be gained?)

2) (I was going to report that) I couldn't figure out how to go from national map to state-level (and lower level) simply by clicking on the state. But that seems to be working this morning. Did something change overnight? (Or maybe I am incompetent to use an online mapping tool? :-)

3) I have a hard time coming up with an intuitive sense of your "street-network sprawl" measure. I am looking at my own town of Lyme, NH https://sprawlmap.org/?map=globe&feature=pca1&type=stock#12.85/43.82175/-72.16825 We're pretty much a two-lane state highway with a group of homes at a crossroads (little interconnectivity). Some blocks are pretty blue, while others are pink, and I haven't been able to figure out the metric.

4) As you zoom in, there's an abrupt transition between colored blocks, and the actual streets. It would be really slick if the map could preserve a faint overlay of the block colors with the map.

5) Some new blocks appeared between the two times I examined the maps yesterday morning and afternoon. There were two blocks for my town when I first opened the map, but now there are several dozen. Is this a "compute on demand and cache" strategy? (That would be very slick!)

6) Do you have plans for allowing other kinds of data to be overlaid on this structure?

Thanks again, and congratulations on such a terrific project!

Rich Brown
Lyme, NH

[cpbl]

Hi Rich,

Glad you like it. Thanks for all these!

Some partial responses:

 (1) If you click on the "Street Network Sprawl" in the top left, you regain the landing page. Does that help?

 (2) No change overnight. :)

 (3) It's complicated, since it's an index of a number of measures.  You can read all about it in our papers. :)  What if you switch the view to "fraction of street segments which are dead ends" (it's called "cul de sacs")? Can you figure these out more easily? I'm using the new secret magical zoom level (see #4):

https://sprawlmap.org/?map=shaded&feature=fraction_deadend&type=stock#12.88/43.81771/-72.17434

(4) Okay. I haven't yet done precisely what you suggest, which is a nice idea, but if you zoom between levels 12.8 and 13, you can see both streets and cells at the same time!   Sumbal has also put in +/- zoom buttons (someone else's request) today but people who rely on those may never find the secret zoom range. 

(5) No change overnight. :)   But there are a lot of options. You may have used the Advanced options and turned off "All years" or chosen a different time period setting.

(6) Not really at the moment.

Thanks!

Chris

[Rich Brown]

Thanks for these responses. I'll rummage around to see what else I can learn from the map.