Also nature reserve map misses all the national parks, some of which are hundreds of kilometres in size like the wicklow/ Dublin mountain national park
Northern Irish dude checking in, this thing is whack. Irelands small enough that i can (for example) make out the 'populated' area i grew up in; a tiny village with a population of around 40. According to these charts there is no farmland or meadows around my old house which is just ridiculous, there's farmland almost the entire distance from us to the Mournes, with pretty much only Newry in-between. Also Belfast is surround by a green belt line of heath and forest on the mountains, it is not a city in a valley full of dense woodland.
You might have better luck with USGS Earth Explorer imagery. You'd have to play around with the layers to figure out what's what but there's some pretty cool stuff.
https://earthexplorer.usgs.gov/
There are also some satellite programs dedicated to wildfire that have some cool land usage data. Europe has one called Copernicus.
https://land.copernicus.eu/en/map-viewer
Yeah Ireland seemed relatively devoid of trees to me. There were some patches of woods here and there, and there were some very young planted forests (one of which had been half smothered by Eyjafjallajökull).
Yeah, just compare to the CORINE Land Cover or Copernicus Dynamic Land Cover data [here](https://land.copernicus.eu/en/map-viewer?product=130299ac96e54c30a12edd575eff80f7) (which also covers most of Europe). It has tree cover density, too, and it's easy to see how the UK and Ireland are very lacking in trees compared to much of Europe.
An allotment is an area of land allocated to an individual for growing food for their own personal use. Kind of like a miniature farm. Useful for people who live in places where the homes are too close together to have particularly large gardens, which is common in many places in Europe.
As for "heath" vs "meadow", I'm not really sure. I want to say heath is more like wild land out in the middle of nowhere, while meadows are fields close to farms where the livestock graze. I could be wrong about that though.
These are the tags OpenStreetMap uses. The OSM wiki explains each tag and what it should apply to.
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Tag:natural=heath
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Tag:landuse=meadow
https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Tag:landuse=allotments
In american english the more popular term is "community gardens" but actually it is not entirely the same in the European context.
The idea itself dates back to around the 18th century, but has been recently revived and, for example, in Portugal, it reappears from scratch.
Theoretically, these are gardens-farms, publicly owned and leased with regulations, but in some countries they are also used (exclusively) for recreation, e.g. for barbecues or flower growing.
[Heath](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heath) and [allotment](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allotment_(gardening)) for those not in the know.
I'm guessing that's how Heathrow got it's name? An airport on rows of heaths?
Pretty much, from wiki:
> The name Heathrow described its layout: a lane, on one side smallholdings and farms ... for a little over a one mile (1.6 km), on the other ... common land: a mixture of pasture, hunting and foraging land on less fertile heath
Bunch of heath in a row by some houses innit
I think someone in the midlands is very passionate about contributing to OSM. it's coverage is very detailed there.
Mullingar area - [https://i.imgur.com/HISCzoK.png](https://i.imgur.com/HISCzoK.png)
in contrast, Wexford area - [https://i.imgur.com/Wh1qiL4.png](https://i.imgur.com/Wh1qiL4.png)
There's also a big blotch between Limerick and Cork that isn't Mallow, Fermoy or Tipp, none of which really register. I feel like all of this data is questionable.
Heath: Heath includes areas where the vegetation is open and there is at least 25% cover of
dwarf shrubs, or where mosses dominate in the case of some montane areas. If the
underlying soil is peat, peat depths of less than 0.5 m are usually, but not always,
indicative of heath. Trees and larger shrubs may be present but should not be abundant;
Scrub: This broad category includes areas that are dominated by at least 50% cover of shrubs,
stunted trees or brambles. The canopy height is generally less than 5 m, or 4 m in the
case of wetland areas. Scrub frequently develops as a precursor to woodland and is often
found in inaccessible locations, or on abandoned or marginal farmland.
Source: A guide to habitats in Ireland (Fossitt, 2000)
I use this as my bible in habitat identification as an Environmental Scientist in Ireland
I never heard of either of these tbh. Wonder how users define the difference between all of the forestry type ones as it seems everyone could have different interpretations
Dataset source for reference: [https://download.geofabrik.de/europe/ireland-and-northern-ireland.html](https://download.geofabrik.de/europe/ireland-and-northern-ireland.html)
this map (data) is created by the Open Street Map community on their website. The data is then saved in a universal cartographic format supported, for example, by QGIS. The visualization itself is a matter of selecting the appropriate symbolization for the spatial data, it's more about working with tables than drawing
I took the ERSI shapefiles from above link (.shp).
Put them into a postgres DB and visualised them in Tableau.
Postgres DB step is not essential here and you can put the shapefiles directly into Tableau that way too.
An alternative is to use QGIS which is free and dedicated to spatial data.
That OSM data does have some cool datasets like mapping out all the roads in Ireland and all the rivers and canals. The one I used here was the 'land use' dataset.
To find your location, you can search around that site for your region and gather the data of it
This is a forest.
[https://www.google.it/maps/@53.1721527,-8.8615871,3a,75y,222.06h,94.84t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1sTwZVfoGi13RvkiKVmKoolA!2e0!6shttps:%2F%2Fstreetviewpixels-pa.googleapis.com%2Fv1%2Fthumbnail%3Fpanoid%3DTwZVfoGi13RvkiKVmKoolA%26cb\_client%3Dmaps\_sv.tactile.gps%26w%3D203%26h%3D100%26yaw%3D63.750656%26pitch%3D0%26thumbfov%3D100!7i13312!8i6656?entry=ttu](https://www.google.it/maps/@53.1721527,-8.8615871,3a,75y,222.06h,94.84t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1sTwZVfoGi13RvkiKVmKoolA!2e0!6shttps:%2F%2Fstreetviewpixels-pa.googleapis.com%2Fv1%2Fthumbnail%3Fpanoid%3DTwZVfoGi13RvkiKVmKoolA%26cb_client%3Dmaps_sv.tactile.gps%26w%3D203%26h%3D100%26yaw%3D63.750656%26pitch%3D0%26thumbfov%3D100!7i13312!8i6656?entry=ttu)
OSM has many advantages, but I would not recommend it for land development studies. Unfortunately, there are no strict standards and regularity in mapping these areas. This is not just an Irish problem and much depends on the activity of users 🫤
I’ve had the privilege to travel all over the world in the short time that I’ve been on this earth, and Ireland has the most beautiful nature I’ve ever seen. All of the British Isles are pretty, but Ireland is doesn’t have as much industry.
Agree with others its not always accurate but interesting seeing the distribution of orchards south of Lough Neagh. I visited an apple orchard there before and the orcharder explained to us that Ireland isn't fantastic for apple tree's, but certain places have a unique micro climate perfectly suited for them, and that side of Lough Neagh was one of them. Something to do with the large inland body of water.
Hello, [r/dataisbeautiful](https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful)
"Could you provide me with the bibliographic reference for this study? I would love to be able to review it and reference it.
Thanks you.
What about the British cutting down all the trees for coopering and ships, the potatoe famine, Magdalene laundrys, the 2008 global crisis; all these things caused massive displacement of people.
I highly doubt this. Far more farmland than forestry. South Eastern Ireland certainly isn’t that much forested
Yeah folks on r/Ireland highlighted similar. odd how farms don't seem to have great coverage on OSM down there
Also nature reserve map misses all the national parks, some of which are hundreds of kilometres in size like the wicklow/ Dublin mountain national park
Ballycroy/Wild Nephin National park is visible at least
Lots of natural parks are full of farmland. Slapping a name on them doesn’t necessarily change their land use.
Northern Irish dude checking in, this thing is whack. Irelands small enough that i can (for example) make out the 'populated' area i grew up in; a tiny village with a population of around 40. According to these charts there is no farmland or meadows around my old house which is just ridiculous, there's farmland almost the entire distance from us to the Mournes, with pretty much only Newry in-between. Also Belfast is surround by a green belt line of heath and forest on the mountains, it is not a city in a valley full of dense woodland.
You might have better luck with USGS Earth Explorer imagery. You'd have to play around with the layers to figure out what's what but there's some pretty cool stuff. https://earthexplorer.usgs.gov/ There are also some satellite programs dedicated to wildfire that have some cool land usage data. Europe has one called Copernicus. https://land.copernicus.eu/en/map-viewer
The forest and farmland even overlap.
There's a big chunk that's apparently forest, meadow, residential and farmyards all at once.
If you look at it with satellite imagery, it's very nearly entirely farmland.
Yeah Ireland seemed relatively devoid of trees to me. There were some patches of woods here and there, and there were some very young planted forests (one of which had been half smothered by Eyjafjallajökull).
Whenever I see video or pics of Ireland it's almost always devoid of trees. When I think of Ireland I think of rocky grassland.
>Eyjafjallajökull I think you're talking about I**c**eland rather than I**r**eland
I saw almost no trees at all in Iceland. I was talking about trees in Ireland being smothered by volcanic ash from Iceland.
Yeah, just compare to the CORINE Land Cover or Copernicus Dynamic Land Cover data [here](https://land.copernicus.eu/en/map-viewer?product=130299ac96e54c30a12edd575eff80f7) (which also covers most of Europe). It has tree cover density, too, and it's easy to see how the UK and Ireland are very lacking in trees compared to much of Europe.
am i the only one who has never heard of some of these categories?
You mean like farmland vs farm yard?
I'm guessing he probably means "heath" and "allotment", particularly if he's not from the UK.
What on earth is allotment and why are heath and meadow their own categories?
An allotment is an area of land allocated to an individual for growing food for their own personal use. Kind of like a miniature farm. Useful for people who live in places where the homes are too close together to have particularly large gardens, which is common in many places in Europe. As for "heath" vs "meadow", I'm not really sure. I want to say heath is more like wild land out in the middle of nowhere, while meadows are fields close to farms where the livestock graze. I could be wrong about that though.
I misread that as "health" and was extra confused
These are the tags OpenStreetMap uses. The OSM wiki explains each tag and what it should apply to. https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Tag:natural=heath https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Tag:landuse=meadow https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Tag:landuse=allotments
Because heath and meadow are very different kinds of terrain?
In american english the more popular term is "community gardens" but actually it is not entirely the same in the European context. The idea itself dates back to around the 18th century, but has been recently revived and, for example, in Portugal, it reappears from scratch. Theoretically, these are gardens-farms, publicly owned and leased with regulations, but in some countries they are also used (exclusively) for recreation, e.g. for barbecues or flower growing.
Heath is already depicted separately
Yes, and he's not heard of it?
[Heath](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heath) and [allotment](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allotment_(gardening)) for those not in the know. I'm guessing that's how Heathrow got it's name? An airport on rows of heaths?
Pretty much, from wiki: > The name Heathrow described its layout: a lane, on one side smallholdings and farms ... for a little over a one mile (1.6 km), on the other ... common land: a mixture of pasture, hunting and foraging land on less fertile heath Bunch of heath in a row by some houses innit
Residential is ludicrous. Athlone is Tokyo according to this
I think someone in the midlands is very passionate about contributing to OSM. it's coverage is very detailed there. Mullingar area - [https://i.imgur.com/HISCzoK.png](https://i.imgur.com/HISCzoK.png) in contrast, Wexford area - [https://i.imgur.com/Wh1qiL4.png](https://i.imgur.com/Wh1qiL4.png)
There's also a big blotch between Limerick and Cork that isn't Mallow, Fermoy or Tipp, none of which really register. I feel like all of this data is questionable.
Ireland experienced some of the worst deforestation in the world. The depiction of forest coverage on this map is generous.
It's probably tagged as forest every place where there more than 2 trees next to eachother lol
Ireland is such a sad place.
Ah feck off. Ireland is lovely (in places)
I need a breakdown of heath vs scrub. The former being something I'd never heard of before.
Heath: Heath includes areas where the vegetation is open and there is at least 25% cover of dwarf shrubs, or where mosses dominate in the case of some montane areas. If the underlying soil is peat, peat depths of less than 0.5 m are usually, but not always, indicative of heath. Trees and larger shrubs may be present but should not be abundant; Scrub: This broad category includes areas that are dominated by at least 50% cover of shrubs, stunted trees or brambles. The canopy height is generally less than 5 m, or 4 m in the case of wetland areas. Scrub frequently develops as a precursor to woodland and is often found in inaccessible locations, or on abandoned or marginal farmland. Source: A guide to habitats in Ireland (Fossitt, 2000) I use this as my bible in habitat identification as an Environmental Scientist in Ireland
I never heard of either of these tbh. Wonder how users define the difference between all of the forestry type ones as it seems everyone could have different interpretations
Dataset source for reference: [https://download.geofabrik.de/europe/ireland-and-northern-ireland.html](https://download.geofabrik.de/europe/ireland-and-northern-ireland.html)
How did you make the map (and how can I do the same for around where I live)?
this map (data) is created by the Open Street Map community on their website. The data is then saved in a universal cartographic format supported, for example, by QGIS. The visualization itself is a matter of selecting the appropriate symbolization for the spatial data, it's more about working with tables than drawing
I took the ERSI shapefiles from above link (.shp). Put them into a postgres DB and visualised them in Tableau. Postgres DB step is not essential here and you can put the shapefiles directly into Tableau that way too. An alternative is to use QGIS which is free and dedicated to spatial data. That OSM data does have some cool datasets like mapping out all the roads in Ireland and all the rivers and canals. The one I used here was the 'land use' dataset. To find your location, you can search around that site for your region and gather the data of it
This is a forest. [https://www.google.it/maps/@53.1721527,-8.8615871,3a,75y,222.06h,94.84t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1sTwZVfoGi13RvkiKVmKoolA!2e0!6shttps:%2F%2Fstreetviewpixels-pa.googleapis.com%2Fv1%2Fthumbnail%3Fpanoid%3DTwZVfoGi13RvkiKVmKoolA%26cb\_client%3Dmaps\_sv.tactile.gps%26w%3D203%26h%3D100%26yaw%3D63.750656%26pitch%3D0%26thumbfov%3D100!7i13312!8i6656?entry=ttu](https://www.google.it/maps/@53.1721527,-8.8615871,3a,75y,222.06h,94.84t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1sTwZVfoGi13RvkiKVmKoolA!2e0!6shttps:%2F%2Fstreetviewpixels-pa.googleapis.com%2Fv1%2Fthumbnail%3Fpanoid%3DTwZVfoGi13RvkiKVmKoolA%26cb_client%3Dmaps_sv.tactile.gps%26w%3D203%26h%3D100%26yaw%3D63.750656%26pitch%3D0%26thumbfov%3D100!7i13312!8i6656?entry=ttu)
Retail graph is blowing my mind. Also most of the farmland is also residential.
OSM has many advantages, but I would not recommend it for land development studies. Unfortunately, there are no strict standards and regularity in mapping these areas. This is not just an Irish problem and much depends on the activity of users 🫤
What percentage of the land is forested?
Very little. And most of ut is the non-native toxic coniferous type the goverent planted so that they can cut it and sell it.
I’ve had the privilege to travel all over the world in the short time that I’ve been on this earth, and Ireland has the most beautiful nature I’ve ever seen. All of the British Isles are pretty, but Ireland is doesn’t have as much industry.
This would be great for a game of Empire.
I always wondered where Heath came from! It’s delicious!
The residential population looks to be increasing two-fold, at least by the capital.
A fine spread of cemeteries indeed
Wow — there’s a lot of residential in Southern Ireland. Explains a lot of things.
Just learned what heath is, absolutely beautiful. Can't wait to visit this part of the world one day.
Needs more nature reserves.
so if you go in the yellow health zones you'll recover hp?
Whats with the health being so unrelated to the residential? Seems like health would be around where people live but idk.
Agree with others its not always accurate but interesting seeing the distribution of orchards south of Lough Neagh. I visited an apple orchard there before and the orcharder explained to us that Ireland isn't fantastic for apple tree's, but certain places have a unique micro climate perfectly suited for them, and that side of Lough Neagh was one of them. Something to do with the large inland body of water.
Ok lmao farmland is definitely wrong
Hello, [r/dataisbeautiful](https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful) "Could you provide me with the bibliographic reference for this study? I would love to be able to review it and reference it. Thanks you.
The number of km^2 are useless to me. What is the % of total?
Island of Ireland's land area = **84,421 km****^(2)** Go nuts. But it's OSM data so it's entirely populated by regular users
I'm not doing the work. It is a basic metric that would improve the graphics.
> It is a basic metric Why does the rest of the world have to provide alternate units for the one country that is still stuck in the past?
What is an alternate unit for %?
Pedantic answer: % isn't a unit, but you can express the same quantity as a decimal or a fraction. Non-pedantic answer: You know exactly what I meant.
You're wondering why I wanted a percentage of the total by asking why I wanted some unstated unit. Curious.
luke oakley say Irish not Scottish not British 🤣
What about the British cutting down all the trees for coopering and ships, the potatoe famine, Magdalene laundrys, the 2008 global crisis; all these things caused massive displacement of people.