On Friday, March 22, 2013, the Federal Aviation Administration released this press release describing a “decision that 149 federal contract towers will close beginning April 7 as part of the agency’s sequestration implementation plan.”
In addition to the release was a document listing the individual name, city, state and airport identification signs of those towers to be closed.
Working on a previous conclusion that perhaps PDFs are not a great way to release data, and that indeed information like this is a) easy to produce and b) very cheap to publish and host as rich interactive content, I took the short time to open this data and make it releasable. Below is the dynamic map which is the result.
##How I Did It I first copied the data from the pdf above, into this text. This ‘data file’ is essentially one row per newly proposed closed airport by the FAA. I saved that document to an excel file, and uploaded that file to this google document sheet. I edited the columns slightly, to concatenate the columns (see column F) into a more readible place name; one that was more likely to be found by a geocoder. I then used this process to associate each row (e.g. airport) with its latitude and longitude.
The same tool described above, contains a way to export this newly geocoded file to a geoJson file. I performed that export, which is this file.
I then used TileMill to create a simple map of these locations.
For all intents and purposes, this process was essentally free and took little time to produce.
####Data The new data files can be found below and so can a brief description of how I did this.
##Notes The process is simple repeatable, but more importantly, the impact of the news item is much more clearly represented. In my (our) previous experiment, independent new applications sprung up. I expect the same might be true here.
September 24, 2019
in reflecting, no single thing could possibly capture what i felt in '89 or after this weekend, but for me i gathered a handful of themes.
September 24, 2019
government is the best place to work. the people are amazing and i have never met any their equal. i am proud to have had a service career.
October 02, 2018
government is the best place to work. the people are amazing and i have never met any their equal. i am proud to have had a service career.
March 24, 2018
Changing the federal acquisition regulation would require an inordinately large shift, likely an Administrative Procedures Act rulemaking or perhaps even legislation, both of which are very unlikely scenarios.
December 04, 2017
i hope that there is a slim chance my children can experience some mountains or canyons, without handrails.
May 11, 2016
these charts help illustrate the mortgage landscape
February 18, 2016
tonight i have remembered the night it shook my bones. i just wanted to write about it for its own sake.
April 15, 2015
it is the opportunity to reflect that everyday activities are the most important thing. it is a milestone that the kid got back to the court from the darkeset depths of therapy, of surgery and of unknown and fear.
February 26, 2015
be very careful of any IT bandwagon, because in reality, it might be a fake band
November 01, 2014
i am so amazed by my uncle. my uncle paul, a stalwart in boulder colorado, has recently had a rebirth of music.
July 29, 2014
it gave me chills because i could hear the dedication in the voice of antero garcia, the teacher, when he asks "how could i have reached out to you better?"
July 12, 2014
I owned and road my first fixed gear bike in the winter of 1985. I was a member of my high school cycling team back then in Fall River (pronounced fall reeva) Ma. Winter's in south eastern new england are a little harsh, there is a good mix of snow, freezing rain storms, north-easters coming in off the atlantic which make for extra salt corrosion see rusty jones.
July 08, 2014
This is an ignite talk i gave at a staff event about american cycling and innovation.
May 24, 2014
Writing out the names of the people who made the success at the fcc. what they did. the real rock stars
November 09, 2013
its been eating at me. the constant tech news. the constant headlines about failed government IT contracting.
October 07, 2013
good design integrates multiple technologies, and highlights the issue, rather than the implementing technology.
October 03, 2013
The antideficiency act is the law currently being invoked for having government employees not work.
October 02, 2013
yesterday was my 2nd furlough day in the 2013 government shutdown. three small things happened to me personally yesterday
October 01, 2013
yesterday was my first day of furlough in the 2013 government shutdown. during the day i did the following things
June 15, 2013
Why the recent GitHub release making geojson files automatic web maps is disruptive.
April 12, 2013
Recently at the FCC, we held an unusual day. We call it D(f)evEx (pronounced as either devex or fedex) Days, and this was our first ever.
March 05, 2013
On Sunday, February 25, 2013, the White House released documents detailing the projected costs to states of the upcoming sequester.