Getting started

Get Started in 4 Steps

  1. Install GrowBikeNet by following the Installation guide.

  2. To check that the installation worked, run the Minimum working example.

  3. Walk through illustrative examples of GrowBikeNet’s features on our Usage pages.

  4. Consult the User reference for complete details on using the package.

Also, if you’re not already familiar with OSMnx and GeoPandas, make sure you read their user guides as GrowBikeNet uses their data structures.

Overview of GrowBikeNet

GrowBikeNet is built on top of OSMnx and GeoPandas. It takes one mandatory parameter, the city name, which it passes via OSMnx to Nominatim, to download a city’s street network. GrowBikeNet then runs the following operations:

  • Optional, also download the city’s existing bicycle network.

  • Create seed points following Szell et al. [2022]. By default this is a grid (square or triangular), but it can also be set to the city’s rail stations, schools, parks, or arbitrary custom points of interest. If the city’s existing bicycle network is used, the seed points are first selected on the bicycle network following Folco et al. [2023].

  • The seed points are linked (triangulated or quadrangulated). If triangulated, by default via Delaunay triangulation (different to the original minimum weight triangulation of Szell et al. [2022], but results are in practice identical). The triangulation or quadrangulation is calculated for the abstract unrouted network with seed point nodes for which egde lengths are taken from the routed street network.

  • The edges which link the seed points are routed on the street network.

  • A metric is computed for all edges. By default this is betweenness centrality.

  • The edges are ranked by this metric, denoting the importance and order of links to build.

  • By default, overlaps between successive edges are removed, including overlaps with the existing bicycle network, if it was used. This operation ensures that added length of new edges, and cumulative lengths, are correct.

  • Data is exported to a results folder, by default to geojson files, but gpkg is also possible. Exported files are the city boundary, the seed points, and the grown edges (and the existing bicycle network, if used).

  • Optional, plots are generated in the results folder for each edge.

  • Optional, a video is generated in the results folder, using the plots as frames.

To try it out, run the: