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https://github.com/espinielli/theblitz
An attempt to map the bombs of the blitz over london
https://github.com/espinielli/theblitz
Last synced: 24 days ago
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An attempt to map the bombs of the blitz over london
- Host: GitHub
- URL: https://github.com/espinielli/theblitz
- Owner: espinielli
- Created: 2012-05-19T12:22:26.000Z (over 12 years ago)
- Default Branch: master
- Last Pushed: 2012-07-22T15:36:00.000Z (over 12 years ago)
- Last Synced: 2024-06-12T17:39:18.299Z (5 months ago)
- Language: JavaScript
- Homepage: http://espinielli.github.com/theblitz/
- Size: 262 KB
- Stars: 1
- Watchers: 3
- Forks: 0
- Open Issues: 0
-
Metadata Files:
- Readme: README.md
- Citation: Citations.md
Awesome Lists containing this project
README
# theblitz Project #
An attempt to map the bombs of the blitz over London.
The idea is to learn to use d3.js and have a video-like effect as in
the [the wealth of nations example][TWoN].
(Or make a stop motion video out of it...)
# The Data #
The nice article and datablog entry of The Guardian --
['London Blitz 1940: the first day's bomb attacks listed in full'][the first day of the London Blitz]
provides access to the historical records of the first air raid over London in 1940.
It is a spreadsheet listing for 843 drops, the time, the address, the type of
bomb and the damage caused.
The times are for 7th Sep 1940.
I converted it to CSV - with ';' as separator - and stored the result
in this project.
## Obtaining lat/lon for the drops ##
I tried various approaches to geocode the addresses in the data set:
* using [nominatim-python][], a python library for [Nominatim][].
### Geocoding via Nominatim ###
The lookup of the 73rd entry in [the data][] file,
> Royal Arsenal, Woolwich, SE18, London, UK
gives
```python
>>> import nominatim
>>> import json
>>> address_lookup=nominatim.Geocoder().geocode('Royal Arsenal, Woolwich, SE18, London, UK')
>>> print json.dumps(address_lookup)
[
{
"display_name": "Royal Arsenal Woolwich Pier, Woolwich, London Borough of Greenwich, Greater London, London, England, SE18, United Kingdom",
"place_id": "2112469544",
"lon": "0.070824870400824",
"lat": "51.4956072184614",
"osm_type": "way",
"licence": "Data Copyright OpenStreetMap Contributors, Some Rights Reserved. CC-BY-SA 2.0.",
"osm_id": "103128361",
"boundingbox": [
"51.4951553344727",
"51.495906829834",
"0.0705746933817863",
"0.0711841061711311"
],
"type": "pedestrian",
"class": "highway",
"address": {
"city": "London Borough of Greenwich",
"state_district": "London",
"suburb": "Woolwich",
"country": "United Kingdom",
"county": "Greater London",
"pedestrian": "Royal Arsenal Woolwich Pier",
"state": "England",
"postcode": "SE18",
"country_code": "gb"
}
}
]
```
### Geocoding via Google Maps v3 ###
It turns out that a lot of addresses are not geocoded by Nominatim,
for example entry 225
> 128 Aylward Street, Stepney E1, London, UK
So I tried Google Maps v3 using [pygeocoder][] library:
```python
>>> import pygeocoder as geo
>>> import json
>>> drop = '128 Aylward Street, Stepney E1, London, UK'
>>> gm_lookup = pygeocoder.Geocoder.geocode(drop)
>>> print json.dumps(gm_lookup.raw, indent=4)
[
{
"geometry": {
"location": {
"lat": 51.5159781,
"lng": -0.0462063
},
"viewport": {
"northeast": {
"lat": 51.5173270802915,
"lng": -0.04485731970849797
},
"southwest": {
"lat": 51.5146291197085,
"lng": -0.04755528029150203
}
},
"location_type": "ROOFTOP"
},
"address_components": [
{
"long_name": "128",
"types": [
"street_number"
],
"short_name": "128"
},
{
"long_name": "Aylward St",
"types": [
"route"
],
"short_name": "Aylward St"
},
{
"long_name": "London",
"types": [
"locality",
"political"
],
"short_name": "London"
},
{
"long_name": "Greater London",
"types": [
"administrative_area_level_2",
"political"
],
"short_name": "Gt Lon"
},
{
"long_name": "United Kingdom",
"types": [
"country",
"political"
],
"short_name": "GB"
},
{
"long_name": "E1 0QW",
"types": [
"postal_code"
],
"short_name": "E1 0QW"
},
{
"long_name": "London",
"types": [
"postal_town"
],
"short_name": "London"
}
],
"partial_match": true,
"formatted_address": "128 Aylward St, London, Greater London E1 0QW, UK",
"types": [
"street_address"
]
}
]
```
But even Google Maps fails, for example on entry 224
> 12 Jewel Street, Stepney E1, London, UK
This street probably does not exist any more.
File addressesNotFound.txt lists the addresses I could not geocode automagically.
I did spot some of them using scanned maps of London from [1908][London1908] and
[1940][London1940] or guessed.
# Timeline #
========
I would like to use [d3.js][d3js] like in
[the wealth of nations][TWoN] example, i.e. with an animation.
The raid started after 16:14 when the German bombers entered British airspace.
So the times from in the Guardian spreadsheet need to be date stamped.
[the first day of the London Blitz]:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2010/sep/06/london-blitz-bomb-map-september-7-1940
"The first day of the London Blitz"
[nominatim]: http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Nominatim
"nominatim reverse geocoding"
[nominatim-python]:
https://github.com/agabel/python-nominatim
"nominatim "
[the data]:
"the spreadsheet for the bombs of first day of London Blitz"
[pygeocoder]:
http://code.xster.net/pygeocoder
"pygeocoder"
[d3js]:
http://d3js.org/
"Data-Driven Documents javascript library"
[TWoN]:
http://bost.ocks.org/mike/nations/
"The Wealth of Nations "
[London1940]:
http://www.maps-of-london.com/
"London map ca. 1940"
[London1908]:
http://mapco.net/bart1908/bart38b.htm
"London map ca. 1908"