Maptitude Help / Routing, Directions, and GPS / Creating Drive-Time Influence Areas
Creating Drive-Time Influence Areas
Maptitude can partition a line layer into zones or territories based on a value in the line layer, such as driving distance or time. When you create drive-time influence areas, Maptitude does not attempt to balance the size or amount of work involved in serving each area.
The results are stored in a table that Maptitude joins to the line (or node) layer. In addition to the ID of the nearest service location, the table contains the impedance (time or distance) from that service location to the feature. You can choose to create a color theme that illustrates the results using either of these values as illustrated below.
The streets in the map on the left are partitioned based on the travel time to the nearest fire station. The color theme on the streets indicates the closest station. The streets in the map on the right have a theme indicating how long it takes to get to them from the nearest fire station.
You can set a maximum value of the cost of service to any feature in an area. When you use this option, the links and nodes that are above the maximum service value are not included in any of the areas. In the link partition table, the service location and value fields will be left blank. For example, if you set a maximum service value of 10 minutes in building drive-time influence areas, any link or node that is more than 10 minutes from any service location will remain unassigned. This option helps you find “holes” in a service network.
You can weight the partitions to create proportional partitioning. For example, if the network has a straight series of links between two service locations, the first location has a weight of 1, and second location has a weight of 2, then one third of the line is assigned to the first location and two thirds is assigned to the second location.
When you create drive-time influence areas you have the option of creating an area layer of zones. The zones are areas that enclose all of the links in the same partition. When you create zones, you can also choose to calculate demographics for the zones.
You can also build areas of influence that are straight-line based, using the Tools>Analysis>Straight Line Influence Areas command. See Creating Areas of Influence to learn more.
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For a video tutorial see: (Internet connection required) • Areas of Influence and Network Partitions: Creating catchment areas based on straight-line distance or drive-time |
To Partition a Network and Create Drive-Time Influence Areas
- If necessary, select the service locations from a point layer.
- Choose Tools>Routing & Directions>Drive-Time Influence Areas or click
Drive-Time Influence Areas in the analysis tools drop-down on the Standard toolbar to display the Drive-Time Influence Areas dialog box.
- Choose the point layer with the service location to use from the Layer drop-down list.
- Choose whether to use all features in the point layer, the visible features, or a selection set from the Using drop-down list.
- Choose a field to identify the features to which the areas belong (e.g., Name, Address, ID) from the Zone Names drop-down list.
- Choose "None" for no weighting on the partitions or choose a field with a weighting value from the Weighted by drop-down list.
- Choose whether to minimize travel time or length/distance from the Minimizing drop-down list.
- Enter a Maximum Time to consider for the partitions.
- Click the Options tab and choose output options as follows:
| Option | What it does |
|---|---|
| Create Zone Layer | Creates an area layer that encompasses the partitioned links |
| Create Link Table | Joins the line partition table to the line layer with information on the nearest feature and impedance that can be used to display a theme |
| Create Node Table | Joins the node partition table to the node layer |
| Display Theme | Creates a color theme of the partition on the links |
| Calculate Demographics | Check to calculate demographics for the areas |
| Create Report | Check to create a report with the map and calculated attributes and optionally enter a title for the report |
- If you checked the Calculate Demographics box, you can specify the attributes to calculate and/or count features in the zones. Click
to display the Demographic Settings dialog box and make choices as follows:
- Choose a reference layer with demographics and the features to use from the with Layer and Using drop-downs list. Typically Maptitude will choose an appropriate layer and demographic fields to use. See To Change the Aggregation Method when Calculating Demographics for information on changing these fields.
- To count features in each zone, choose the layer whose features you want to count and the features to use from the Layer and Using drop-down lists.
- To subtotal the counted features, choose a field to use for grouping and the category types to group or choose None to get the total count of features without subtotaling. For example, you could use the "Type" field in the landmark layer and choose to find the number of restaurants and schools within the zones.
- Choose a field from the feature count layer to aggregate from the Sum drop-down list. For example, you could calculate the total revenue of customers within the zones.
- Click OK to return to the Drive-Time Influence Areas dialog box.
Maptitude partitions the network, creates the link and/or node partition table, and displays the results.
Try It Yourself: Creating Drive-Time Influence Areas
1. Choose File>New Workspace, choose New map of my data/table/spreadsheet from the first scroll list, and click OK.
2. In the Tutorial folder, open the Excel spreadsheet with logistics data for your country (e.g., Logistics Australia.xlsx, Logistics United States.xlsx, etc.).
3. Choose the Sites sheet and click OK. Maptitude displays Create-a-Map Wizard.
4. Click Next>, choose the first "Locate" option in the scroll list, and click Finish. Maptitude locates the five sites and displays the locate results.
5. Click OK to display the map with the located sites.
6. Choose Tools>Routing & Directions>Drive-Time Influence Areas or click Drive-Time Influence Areas in the analysis tools drop-down on the Standard toolbar to display the Drive-Time Influence Areas dialog box.
7. Choose Sites Layer from the Layer drop-down list, All Features from the Using drop-down list, [Site Name] from the Zone Names drop-down list, Travel Time from the Minimizing drop-down list, and type 15 in the Maximum Time edit box.
8. Click the Options tab and check the Create Zone Layer, Create Link Table , and Display Theme boxes.
9. Click OK. Maptitude creates the drive-time influence areas around the sites up to a maximum drive time of 15 minutes, adds a color theme to the streets indicating the closest site, and adds a new zone layer showing the areas. All streets that are outside the zones are more than 15 minutes from one of the sites.
10. Choose File>Close Workspace and click Don't Save to close the workspace without saving any changes.
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