RCzechia

This project downloads a set of shapefiles relevant to the Czech Republic. It was inspired by the popular tigris package for US datasets.

For examples of RCzechia in action please see the package vignette:

• Visualizing Czech Population
• Geocoding Locations & Drawing them on a Map
• Distance Between Prague and Brno
• Geographical Center of the City of Brno
• Interactive Map
• KFME Grid Cells - faunistické čtverce
• Terrain of the Czech Republic
• Senate elections of 2020

The administrative area polygons are based on the RÚIAN register; the natural objects were based originally on ArcČR 500 by ARCDATA and later moved to Data200 by ČÚZK.

The shapefiles are by necessity larger than the limits of a CRAN package size allow. The data are therefore stored remotely (on Amazon Cloud / AWS S3) and downloaded as required. As consequence a working internet connection is required to fully use the package.

For the most commonly used shapes (republika, kraje and okresy) an optional low resolution version is also included. To access it specify the value of resolution parameter as "low" (default is "high").

Access to the external files is logged, from time to time I check the logs (mainly to better understand my bandwidth charges).

A note to Czech users

Tohle je “oficiální”, a tedy anglické, readme. Českou verzi naleznete na http://www.jla-data.net/cze/package-rczechia/

Installation

The package is on CRAN (as of March 2018) so to get a stable version simply run:

install.packages("RCzechia")

You can also get the latest development version by running remotes::install_github("jlacko/RCzechia"). The main branch should be always reasonably stable, but I do not suggest cloning of development branches unless you know what you are doing - these are where the action is happening, raw in tooth and claw.

The following spatial objects are included:

administrative:

• republika: borders of the Czech Republic as a polygon
• kraje: 14 regions of the Czech Republic & Prague.
  
• okresy: 76 districts (LAU1 areas) of the Czech Republic + Prague (legally not a district but the capital).
  
• orp_polygony 205 municipalities with extended powers (in Czech: obce s rozšířenou působností) + Prague (legally not a city but the capital).
  
• obce_polygony: 6.258 municipalities of the Czech Republic.
  
• obce_body the same as obce_polygony, but centroids instead of polygons.
  
• casti: primarily 57 city parts of Prague, but also of other cities with defined parts (Brno, Ostrava and other).
  
• senat_obvody: 81 senate districts (volební obvody senátu)
• volebni_okrsky: 14.761 general election districts (volební okrsky)
• zip_codes: 2.671 ZIP code areas (poštovní směrovací čísla / PSČ)

natural:

• reky: streams and rivers
• plochy: stillwaters (lakes and ponds).
• silnice: roads (highways, speedways etc.)
• zeleznice: railroads
• chr_uzemi: protected natural areas (chráněná území)
• lesy: woodland areas (more than 30 ha in area)
• KFME_grid: KFME grid cells (faunistické čtverce)
• vyskopis: terrain of the Czech republic as a {raster} package object

All objects are implemented as functions returning data frames, so must be followed by brackets (i.e. hranice <- republika()).

In addition a number of utility functions is provided:

• geocode: interfaces to geocoding API of ČÚZK.
• revgeo: interfaces to reverse geocoding API of ČÚZK.

A call for action

The project is actively maintained, and ideas & suggestions to improve the package are greatly welcome. Should you feel more at ease with old fashioned email than the GitHub ticketing system - do drop me a line.

But raising an issue is preferable, as I am human and I forget; GitHub does not suffer from such a failing, and will keep on reminding me till the sun and moon are darkened, and the stars no longer shine.