Canadian federal polling division files

[Teddy (IDS Legislator)]

Hello. I'm wondering how you guys made those maps? I'm a map maker myself and if someone can teach me how to do this I can continue with the project for everyone to enjoy.

[Hatman]

Hello. I'm wondering how you guys made those maps? I'm a map maker myself and if someone can teach me how to do this I can continue with the project for everyone to enjoy.

See the first few posts of this thread of instructions.

[The Head Beagle]

Hello. I'm wondering how you guys made those maps? I'm a map maker myself and if someone can teach me how to do this I can continue with the project for everyone to enjoy.

See the first few posts of this thread of instructions.

To be a little more specific, what I've done is download the poll-by-poll results from Elections Canada in .csv format, then open these files in Excel, and then get the winning percentage for each poll immediately by a code, =(MAX(squares with the total for each candidate))/(total ballots - rejected ballots). The actual mapmaking I've been doing more manually - I zoom into the riding I want in QuantumGIS, take a picture of the screen, and then fill in the polls individually in Paintbrush (the open-source knockoff of Paint for Mac), using a colour palette I made, keeping the GIS file open while doing this so I can identify the poll numbers using the Identify function. I think this is basically what others are doing except for the506 who seems to have been able to do the colouring by some code as well.

I've been a bit busy for such procrastinatory projects recently, but next Wednesday I have a long trip on Amtrak, so I'm going to have a go at the Kitchener/Waterloo/Cambridge region if I can get a seat with an electrical outlet.

[Hatman]

awesome

[deansherratt]

http://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?action=gallery;sa=view;id=1821

This is a map of toronto that I just completed for the 1999 provincial election. Harris's second majority. It was taken from our second floor while I placed it on our back deck.

I have also uploaded it to images section but am having my usual difficulties pasting it here. 

[Sibboleth]

Just copy the image linking code:



Nice work, btw

[deansherratt]

For those who may have ever lived in Toronto, do look at the riding of Toronto Centre where you will see a few green-coloured polls (including Toronto Island). These were polls won by Independent candidate John Sewell. He was considered a radical, anti-development alterman who was also mayor for one term. In 1999, he was a strong third and aside from the island, ran well in ultra wealthy Rosedale.

[The Head Beagle]

For those who may have ever lived in Toronto, do look at the riding of Toronto Centre where you will see a few green-coloured polls (including Toronto Island). These were polls won by Independent candidate John Sewell. He was considered a radical, anti-development alterman who was also mayor for one term. In 1999, he was a strong third and aside from the island, ran well in ultra wealthy Rosedale.

Ah yes, John Sewell. He was considered on the left during his career when the developers he opposed were corporate, but then he made a comeback in the last municipal election to oppose an NDP councillor because Sewell opposed the conversion of an old-style in-traffic streetcar line to a dedicated track, on the grounds that it would "divide the street". He also appears to have won a few polls in Yorkville here if I'm not mistaken (just west of Rosedale, west of Yonge St).

[The Head Beagle]

Waterloo/Kitchener/Cambridge, 2008. Somehow the Liberals managed to win themselves zero of these seats. A few notes and comments at the bottom. Larger version in the gallery.



1. My picture of the screen cut off the very top of Kitchener-Waterloo, but there are no polls missing - that top one just extends to the corner. So Kitchener-Conestoga is the riding both in the western end of the map and immediately NE of the urban region.
2. Similarly I got in a tiny bit of Guelph at the top right which I didn't bother to download and is just white; the whole city's in an earlier post in the thread.
3. Grey ties are Lib-Con except one Con-NDP adjacent to the NDP poll in SE Kitchener Centre and one Lib-NDP (sort of oval with two branches in west-central Kitchener Centre).
4. I made my colour scheme only down to 30, but there are a very few polls won with about 29 in the strip of central Kitchener that straddles the riding boundary; I didn't bother getting a new colour for these.
4. The Kitchener/Waterloo city limit is a couple of polls NW of and roughly parallel to the riding border between K. Centre and K.-W.

The City of Waterloo is the most white-collar part of the area, with a significant IT industry (RIM which makes the Blackberry smartphone is headquartered here), but also has the region's two universities and therefore a large student population. The U. Waterloo campus is in the geographically large Liberal polls in the NW, and I think the strong Liberal area to its south is quite studenty. Kitchener is more industrial, but has a reputation for small specialized manufacturers rather than the big unionized employers that dominate Hamilton or Windsor, and it doesn't really have a history of labour politics. It also has a significant German heritage. Cambridge is the merger of the city of Galt (in the SE) with the smaller towns of Preston and Hespeler (just north of Galt) and is still basically the city and two towns in terms of urban form and self-identification. It is home to a large non-union Toyota plant.

[Hashemite]

Random new stuff:

[Hatman]

Ahh, weird.

We need to get these done soon!

[Hashemite]

Here's Brant



I think all of the Liberal polls in the larger rural areas are Native reserves. The main town is the small industrial centre of Brantford. The other towns are Paris and Burford.

[Hatman]

that used to be an NDP seat

[deansherratt]

That takes me back to my home from 1954-1960.

The SE rural polls are the Six Nations Reserve but have a very poor turnout generally.

Up to the 1970s much of Brantford was industrial working class with a much smaller middle class element and literally two high income polls. The Conservative base was in the (few) suburban polls, rural areas and Paris while the NDP/Liberals dominated in the rest of the city. With northern and SW Brantford larger and with rural reas very strongly Conservative, there has been a shift towards the party.

[The Head Beagle]

Niagara Falls:

The tie in NW Niagara Falls (city proper) is Con/Lib, while the one at the south end of the city and the middle poll of that three-poll village on Lake Erie are Con/NDP.

[Hashemite]

A map of the three London ridings would be fun.

[Vasall des Midas]

Echoed!

[deansherratt]

There is always Toronto. Can the completed Toronto maps be used as part of a larger map?

[Hashemite]

And also Greater Quebec, so far we only had the sane riding in Quebec (inner city).

And Laval too would be fun. And the rest of Calgary and Edmonton, though depressing.

[The Head Beagle]

With these bigger ones we should co-ordinate so two people don't spend time on the same map. I can volunteer for London, unless someone's started it already.

Another interesting one would be B.C. Southern Interior.

[Teddy (IDS Legislator)]

When I finish my timelines I'll work on some of these.

Here's a list of what I'd like to see. NOTE: some of these have been done already!!

Toronto (all 23 ridings) PART DONE (about half done)
Vancouver Area (Lower Mainland) DONE (Abbotsford/Langley would be nice)
Montreal DONE
Laval and the South Shore of Montreal NOT DONE
Quebec City PART DONE (only one riding done)
All of PEI PART DONE (only one riding done)
Labrador NOT DONE
Halifax (the legal city, warning, its huge) DONE
Cape Breton, the island NOT DONE
Kent County NB NOT DONE
The Saugenay region NOT DONE
The Eastern Townships and Sherbrooke NOT DONE
The Outouais region (Pontiac, Hull, Gatineau) DONE
Vaudriel NOT DONE
Ottawa, the entire legal city PART DONE (rural areas needed)
Kingston NOT DONE
Barrie NOT DONE
Guelph DONE
London NOT DONE
Kitchener-Waterloo DONE
Windsor DONE
Owen Sound DONE
The Enitre Niagara RegionPART DONE (Niagara West needed)
Hamilton DONE
The Entire GTA (Halton, Peel, Durham, and York regions) PART DONE (Bramp, Osh, Newm done)
Winnipeg as a whole DONE
Regina DONE
Saskatoon DONE
Prince Albert riding NOT DONE
Edmonton as a whole PART DONE (one riding done)
Calgary as a whole NOT DONE
Athabaska riding NOT DONE
Prince George, the city NOT DONE
The Territories PART DONE (Yukon needed)
DONE
PART DONE
NOT DONE



I think if we focus on the above list and get it done, what'd be left would be minor enough to do quickly to just fill in the gaps.

Alternatively, we just dont finish it, and work towards finishing a 2009 map.

Either way we really should claim certain cities so we dont both work towards the same city.

[mileslunn]

I am new to these forums, but I was wondering if anyone knows how to create these maps as they don't seem to work on my computer.  I was able to crunch the poll numbers by municipality however in some parts of Canada, so I could do any municipal maps that anyone would like.

[The Head Beagle]

London:


Ties are Lib/Con except the fat "L" almost at the very east end of London West which is Con/NDP.

[Hatman]

I started working on the London North Centre by-election map a while ago, but never finished it. Looks like a lot of the Green support went to the Liberals. Nice to see the NDP do so well in LNC

I am new to these forums, but I was wondering if anyone knows how to create these maps as they don't seem to work on my computer.  I was able to crunch the poll numbers by municipality however in some parts of Canada, so I could do any municipal maps that anyone would like.

Municipal maps would be really cool too. Unfortunately, I have little patience for that kind of thing.

[The Head Beagle]

I started working on the London North Centre by-election map a while ago, but never finished it. Looks like a lot of the Green support went to the Liberals. Nice to see the NDP do so well in LNC

The southeast of the riding is way out of whack with the rest of it - in many polls in the more red and blue areas the NDP is way back with the Greens competing for 3rd and 4th. It seems that Adelaide (the first long vertical street apparent on the map west of the North Centre/Fanshawe boundary) may be a more natural demographic divide than Highbury (the actual boundary).

The combination of working-class east, academic/middle-class-liberal north, and more wealthy conservative west is sort of oddly reminiscent of the original London. (Obviously a huge simplification in the case of the larger one).