By Boris Gusev, Geovis Course Assignment, SA8905, Fall 2015 (Rinner)
The way in which we settle the land around us can paint a rich picture of how our cities have developed over years. By the turn of the 19th century, urban planners generally agreed that grid-like patterns were the optimal solution and held the most promise for the future of transit. Physical planning led to the development of automotive cities like Los Angeles, Chicago and Detroit. Toronto’s history of growth can also be traced through its sprawling grid of roads.
In this visualization, a MapZen extract of OpenStreetMap road network was used to represent the compass-heading-based orientation of Toronto roads. Streets that are orthogonal, meaning that they intersect at a right angle, are assigned the same colours. At a 90 degree angle, the streets are coloured with the darkest shades of orange or blue, decreasing in intensity as the intersection angle becomes more obtuse.
Follow the link to take a look at: Toronto Streets by Orientation
More exciting details and a DIY guide under the cut. Kudos to Stephen Von Worley at Data Pointed for the inspiration and Mathieu Rajerison at Data & GIS Tips for the script and a great how-to.
Continue reading T.Orientation: Colouring the Grids of Toronto