This project contains code to generate maps of the United Kingdom divided by constituency lines. One can supply constituency-level data, such as number of voters, to see the constituency break down of the data.
Formally known as choropleth maps, the plots are generated using geopandas and matplotlib.
This repo also implements hex maps, in which each constituency is represented by an equally sized hexagon. These maps can be invaluable for visualising elections in areas where constituencies are not equally sized. For example, in the UK, Labour traditionally do well in metropolitan areas, which contain many small constituencies, whereas the Conservatives do well in the less densely populated shires. Looking at a more realistic map the UK could give the false impression that Convervatives were vastly outperforming Labour.
The mapper classes are implemented in map/. Currently, only hex maps have been implemented. These maps are created using the fantastic tool by
ODILeeds. There is a script in utils/hex_to_csv
which converts the "hexjson" files created by ODILeeds into csv files.
This repo uses data from the Revoke Article 50 petition in the example files to demonstrate how to create choropleth maps.
Clone the repo and run python -m examples.hexmap in the root directory to see an example hexmap, using
data taken from the Revoke Article 50 petition.
This example file will show you how to use the HexMap class the create a choropleth map of the United Kingdom.
"Real" maps coming soon
The plots use the generalised parliamentary boundaries as of December 2015 by default (error downloading more recent data - update on the way). To use different geographic divisions, download the shapefile you want and replace the dataset loaded in the example.
You can download official UK boundaries here.
Note: Make sure you copy all of the files, not just the shp file.
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland operates elections under a first-past-the-post (fptp) system. The nation is split into hundreds of constituencies of roughly the same number of citizens.
In General Elections, the politician with the most votes in each constituency is elected as that constituency's representative to the House of Commons, as one of 650 Members of Parliament (MP).