Now that TIGER has officially moved to the shapefile format, the only TIGER data left in the previous format available on the Census website is the 2006 Second Edition data, and that’s likely to disappear at some point in the future. GIS@Vassar links to an announcement at ICPSR that they have TIGER data in the original format from 1990-2006 archived for download here. Convert it to shapefile format with the free version of tgr2shp, or to KML with tgr2kml.
Archive for the 'TIGER' Category
Over a year ago, I posted about the transition of US Census TIGER vector data from their non-standard format to shapefile format. Despite what you might have read elsewhere, the new TIGER shapefiles hadn’t been released yet … until today. They’ve been saying for months now that they expected to release them in March of 2008, and they made it just under the wire.
Rich at GPS Tracklog cites OpenStreetMap’s recently-completed importation of the TIGER road data for the US, and challenges me to take a look at exporting it to a Garmin GPS (based on this post, I assume). OK, sure.
Continue reading ‘A Look At OpenStreetMap’s TIGER Data Exported To A Garmin GPS’
Bruce Ralston, author of the free TIGER to shapefile conversion utility tgr2shp, has a new program called tgr2kml that converts US Census TIGER file polygons (but not points or lines) into KML files. It works on TIGER files from 1994 to 2006 Second Edition (future TIGER data will be issued directly in shapefile and web formats).
First select the TIGER files you want to process (they can be in zipped format):
In addition to its primary function in retrieving, displaying and exporting TerraServer imagery like USGS topo maps and aerial imagery, USAPhotoMaps has some handy additional capabilities. I’ll talk about the GPS functions in another post, but here are some other useful functions available in USAPhotoMaps:
Haven’t had a chance to try it yet, but RoadNav is an open source GPS Road Navigation program that uses TIGER data to generate street maps and turn-by-turn directions, gives verbal commands, and doesn’t require an Internet connection. Also runs on Linux and Mac OS X, in addition to Windows. I usually drive alone, and it’s a *really* bad idea to use a PC-based road navigation program as the driver, so I don’t know when I’ll get around to it. If anyone tries it out, please let me know how it works for you.
Addendum from the comments: Check out this SlashGEO posting for links to other freeware road navigation solutions.
As long as I’m on the topic of geocoding and TIGER … The NCSA (National Center for Supercomputing Applications) has an online geocoding application. Paste in US addresses in a comma-delimited format, and you’ll get back geocoded results in either tab-delimited or Excel spreadsheet format. It uses TIGER for the geocoding, so its accuracy will vary depending on the area. There are also geocoders for zip codes, IP hosts, and cities and landmarks, both United States and international.
Not too long ago, I posted about a free US Census TIGER to shapefile converter that works with older TIGER files, with the TIGER 2006 1st edition, and will be updated to work with the 2006 2nd edition TIGER files. Just found out that it won’t have to be updated to deal with future versions. Upcoming editions of TIGER will be issued in:
- Shapefile format
- TIGER/GML
- WebTIGER, a Web Feature Service (WFS)
- Web Mapserver (WMS), delivering data in raster graphic and SVG format
See the Census web page on “The Future Of TIGER/Line” for more info. No more paying $399 for TIGER data and the data converters.
