What’s new?
Taking into account future transport developments is often vital when running spatial analysis. New public transport infrastructure can make previously unreachable areas suddenly more accessible, and with this comes more opportunities and more potential value in these areas.
When tackling questions like where to open a new retail store, or where to relocate an office to, or how to value a real estate asset, ‘future proofing’ decisions as much as possible is crucial.
TravelTime already supports the ability to add Crossrail into the UK’s public transport network, but we have now also made the Northern Line Extension available for clients.
What did we do?
As with the Crossrail extension that we have previously modelled, we took the current UK public transport network and added in the planned extension of the Northern line underground line between Kennington and Battersea.
Once tested, we deployed this future network onto a new server so that the suite of TravelTime tools can run on top of it.
What does this look like in practice?
The impact of this new addition to the transport network can be seen when using any of the key TravelTime tools:
Isochrones
Analysis run using the TravelTime add-in for ArcGIS Pro
This analysis shows the reachable areas within 20 minutes by public transport from Kennington Station. The green shape shows the area reachable on the standard network, while the red shape shows the reachable area using the Northern Line extension.
Routes
Analysis run using the TravelTime plugin for QGIS
Calculating the fastest public transport route between London Bridge and Battersea Power Station visually shows the difference with and without the Northern Line Extension.
The turn-by-turn directions for the route using the Northern Line Extension also demonstrate the new line being used.
Origin-Destination Matrix
Standard network travel times (s):
Northern Line Extension network travel times (s):
Analysis run using the TravelTime Matrix macro for Alteryx
These two matrices show the travel times in seconds between multiple origins and destinations. When comparing the two, it’s clear to see that journey times are reduced as a result of the new Northern Line Extension.
How can I start using it?
The new Northern Line Extension can be accessed either directly through our API, or through one of our fully supported plugins into ArcGIS Pro, QGIS and Alteryx.
API
- Change the request URL from https://api.traveltimeapp.com to https://northernline.api.traveltimeapp.com
ArcGIS
- Open the Settings window from the TravelTime section of the top navigation
- Change the URL in the Customize Endpoint:
- Standard URL - https://api.traveltimeapp.com
- Northern Line URL - https://northernline.api.traveltimeapp.com
- To revert back to the standard public transport network, simply hit the reset button
QGIS
- Open the Config window from the TravelTime section of the top navigation
- Change the URL in the Customize Endpoint:
- Standard URL - https://api.traveltimeapp.com
- Northern Line URL - https://northernline.api.traveltimeapp.com
- To revert back to the standard public transport network, simply hit the reset button
Alteryx
- Add any of the TravelTime macros to a workflow then right click on the macro and select Open Macro
- Locate the final Formula tool before the ‘Download data from endpoint’ Message tool
Example shown for the Travel Time Matrix macro
- Open the Formula tool and “northernline.” in front of “api.traveltimeapp” in the URL
- Save the macro and return to the original workflow. Alteryx will confirm that the macro has been updated
- To return to using the standard public transport network, repeat these steps and remove “northernline.” from the URL
To get started with your own Northern Line Extension analysis, sign up for a free trial API key here.
If there are other future transport networks that you are interested in having modelled, please contact us at sales@traveltime.com