• Contents

Scenario

<aside> 📢 This exercise assumes that you have completed the Geoprocessing, Aggregation, & the Modifiable Areal Unit Problem: Trees in NYC exercise.

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Your preliminary analysis of the distribution of street trees raised interesting questions about both the effects of the modifiable areal unit problem and the efficacy of analyzing one variable (street trees) in isolation. After some consideration, you have decided (a) to expand your analysis to compare street tree density relative to land uses and proximity to parks and then (b) to test your method of comparison by examining just one area in the city, with a variety of land uses centered around a park. For this case study, you will examine the neighborhood surrounding McCarren Park in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, which meets those criteria and has experienced high levels of development in the years since the Million Tree initiative was announced. Specifically, the questions under consideration are

• Do street trees increase in density with distance from the park?
• Are street trees more concentrated where residential land uses are greatest?

Assignment & Deliverables

Complete the exercise below, answering the embedded questions.

After completing the exercise, produce one figure suitable for inclusion within an academic paper that describes the analysis and findings. The figure may include multiple thematic (or other) maps, but they must be related such that their presentation together is not confusing or misleading to a reader. Given its format, the figure should be no larger than 6.5 inches by 9 inches (portrait orientation)—i.e., the interior dimensions of a US letter-size page with one-inch margins.

In planning and designing the map deliverable, consider the following:

• The audience, context, purpose, and size of this deliverable format are quite different than previous exercises.
• Is it necessary for a map to present the conclusions for each of the research questions? Consider where an infographic (chart, graph, etc) might be clearer.
• Is the relationship between the different data sets represented clear? Might a diagram or brief, accessible text help clarify the findings?
• Given that the analysis focuses on a neighborhood-scale case study, is there enough contextual information for a reader to understand the location represented by the map(s)?
• If multiple thematic maps are presented within the same composition, are they presented at the same scale? If not, is the scalar difference valuable for communicative purposes (is one map being emphasized over the other)? Are the scales clear to the reader?
• Given the standard land use colors, are the colors used for other data layers legible?

Data

<aside> 💾 Download and unzip the exercise data package from google drive, saving it to your working directory.

Exercise data packages are accessible with a Columbia University login. If you would like a copy of the full course materials, see here.

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To answer the research questions, we will use a few of the datasets from the Geoprocessing, Aggregation, & the Modifiable Areal Unit Problem: Trees in NYC exercise as well as a couple layers from the previous Mapping Data exercises. In addition, we will retrieve our land use information from the city’s MapPLUTO database which includes detailed information by tax lot throughout the city.

The 2016 v2 edition of the MapPLUTO database for Brooklyn is included in this exercise’s data package in the \vector\ folder. MapPLUTO data is available on the NYC DCP’s Bytes of the Big Apple website at http://www1.nyc.gov/site/planning/data-maps/open-data/dwn-pluto-mappluto.page A PDF of its Data Dictionary is included in this exercise’s \docs\ folder. Scroll through it quickly for a sense of the vast amount of information per tax lot the dataset includes. Most fields contain data collected by the NYC Department of Finance as part of the RPAD (Real Property Assessment Database) which serves in the city’s taxation.

New York City Department of City Planning. 2016. MapPLUTO Release 16v2 [shapefile]. Retrieved from http://www1.nyc.gov/site/planning/data-maps/open-data/dwn-pluto-mappluto.page.