There's a new version of Dave's Redistricting. The big change is that you can Auto Color a voting district map from a block assignment file. Previously you could do this only for a block group map. At this moment this is enabled only for Florida, but I will add the ability for more states in the next few days.
[Update: Ability now enabled for all states with voting districts! Also, version 2.2.17 fixes a bug with PA and NM updated voting districts that was introduced in 2.2.16.]
And using that feature, I created a DRA map for the recent Florida State Senate Congress plan.
More below the fold.
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First, on the Florida map, a lot of voting district are split between congressional districts, so I did make a few adjustments to even out the numbers a bit. You will notice, however, that some districts have disjoint pieces, particular 3 and 23. Connecting them could not be done without moving too many people that didn't belong in those districts. I did upload the unadjusted Florida map, so you can look at that, too. (See the Maps folder discussion below.)
Why the new feature? Block assignment files (aka block equivalency files) list, for each census block, which district the block goes in. Census blocks are generally the smallest redistricting unit. Dave's Redistricting deals only with block groups or voting districts, each composed of census blocks, because using census blocks would make the app unusable for large states. (Florida has nearly 500,000 and California over 700,000.) So in order to use a block assignment file to color your map, the app needs to be able map the blocks into those larger units. For block groups it's easy, because the block ID contains the block group ID. That feature was added in June and used to create a map of the California commission's plan. Voting districts are trickier, but the Census Bureau does publish a file that describes the mapping from blocks to voting districts. And now, the app can use those files.
Other new features:
-- when you click Color By Population, the Color By Population Settings automatically comes up. It's been there, but hard to find. (Bet most of you never knew it was there!)
-- Adjusting the size of city/town names can now be correctly saved and loaded.
38 states now have some election data. Roguemapper has been truly amazing getting election data. Some states are very hard and he has done an incredible amount of work (all while keeping his professors happy in grad school). More data coming soon, too. Also, I've gotten some more data from the profs. (Note that the Missouri data is pretty messed up, by roguemapper is working on fixing it.)
And now you can browse the Maps folder, where you can find DRFs (files that can be loaded into DRA) for the California plan, the Florida plan mentioned above and the September Washington state plans. Look for more maps in the future.
Thanks!