Roadmap Out of Lockdown

View the animation

About the map

After the recent government announcement, shops and services prepared themselves to open their doors to the public between March and July 2021. This animation reveals what that journey out of the latest lockdown might look like. The maps reveal the locations that will then open after a key date, to visualise how each city switches back on.  

Why it works

I’m sure everybody is keeping tabs on the key dates (specifically pub gardens), but this map goes one further to show how that translates in a visual pattern across the city. The firefly symbology creates a lightbulb style symbology that looks like the map is illuminating, phase by phase. You can start to see pockets of urban areas emerge where retail services and schools begin to cluster. This forms a dense pattern of urban areas where the heart of the city is really located. 

Requirements

  • Data and software

    These maps were created in ArcGIS Pro 2.7 with additional graphics added in Adobe Photoshop. They were created into a video using Adobe Premier Pro. The data used was Ordnance Survey’s Point of Interest and AddressBase Plus. 

  • Analysis

    This map applies spatio-temporal analysis to reveal patterns across the city. Using location and time, this allows for further visual interpretation to take place. 

  • Time

    Each map is created in a still frame, which required a significant amount of time to set up but once a frame template had been created, it was simply a case of switching layers on and off.

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Tips and tricks

  • Colour

    The use of colour on the legend text allowed for an easy-to-understand map legend.

  • Animating

    We exported several still images and stitched them together in Adobe software, but there are free online gif makers that can create the same output. The trick is to keep the map extent identical for each frame.

  • Area of Interest

    Using an area of interest mask with transparency, this allowed us to draw the attention to each city boundary and fade the less relevant data. 

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Links & Resources

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Sam Bark, Cartographer

Map Author

Sam Bark

Sam Bark is a Cartographer on the Product Communications team at Esri UK. Aside his passion for map design, Sam’s other interests extend to fair-weather cycling, London’s diverse food scene and photography.

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