Spatial-temporal GIS Archives

Intertwining views of sightseeing and eating patterns of tourists on the West Coast of New Zealand over 3 days. In spatial ringmap, each ring represents a sub-regional zone ordered from North to South working outwards. Each sector represents one hour starting from zero o’clock of the first day. The spatial ringmap and the inset map display the temporal and the overall volume of sightseeing (colour) and eating (extrusion) activities in the 20 sub-regional zones respectively.

Multi-view GIS

Multi-view GIS provides different perspectives of space and time for a given geographic area.

For the last two decades, GIS technologies have increasingly been used to incorporate not only spatial relationships but also analyzing and visualizing space across time. Spatial-temporal GIS, or 4D GIS, has, in particular, become essential in areas where GIS is needed for predicting dimensions across time.

The easiest way to show spatial change over time: side by side maps each showing a slice of time.

Time and GIS: Ways of Representing Time on a Map

by Caitlin Dempsey

Spatialtemporal visualization are ways to illustrate changes in an area over time on a map. The famous geographer Immanuel Kant maintained that geography was the study of knowledge in a location, while history was the study of knowledge in time. This article explores different cartographic methods of showing changes in time over space on a map.