This page presents the output maps from our paper “Cities as Inverted Watersheds”.
We delineate consumption centers in the continental U.S. by applying our algorithm to 4.6 million POIs. We use \(\sigma\) = 500 meters (= 5 cells on 100 x 100 meter cell grid) as the baseline parameter.
This online map shows only those consumption centers that contain 20 or more POIs, to prevent cluttering on the map. The shapefile below has all consumption centers regardless of their size.
We also identify whole cities in the continental U.S. by applying the same algorithm. We \(\sigma\) = 12 kilometers (12 cells on 1 x 1 kilometer cell grid) as the baseline parameter, chosen to align our delineated boundaries closely with CBSAs.
This online map show only those cities with 100 or more POIs.The shapefile below has all delineated cities.
We also provide the maps of consumption centers for the three largest cities in Canada, with \(\sigma\) = 500 meters.
The numbers of POIs for Canadian consumption centers are not directly comparable to their US counterparts; we apply different criteria for which POIs to include for US and Canada due to data availability.