Blog Post 3: Draft Maps

 

Since my last post, I've made a lot of progress. I've georeferenced the survey image onto the imagery map and created feature layers for the current and new cemetery boundaries. I've made a couple of drafts that show different methods of laying out the cemetery with all of the restrictions that have been imposed. 

The most surprising aspect of my project so far has been the amount of thought I've had to put in the design. I feel responsible for making the layout as functional and sensible as possible because they want to get the most space out of their new purchase as possible. Plus it has to be visually pleasing.

The hardest part of this project has been figuring out how to use the space economically. The parcel runs diagonally, but the plots all have to be aligned to face East. If the plots could run parallel to the sides of the property, most of the space could be used. Since they cannot, space will unfortunately be wasted. They also want a road that runs through the cemetery so that will take away space as well. To prevent unnecessary loss of space from the road, it should align with the plots. However, since the edge of the cemetery runs at an angle, the road cannot provide access to all areas of the cemetery.

The most interesting part of this project was realizing that the cemetery is using adjacent land that does not belong to them. 

Is there a better way to lay out this cemetery? 

Figure 1. Extent Map of whole cemetery. The green is the current cemetery and the blue is the new plot that was just acquired. 











Figure 2. This version has the road running alongside the plots in the same direction. The main issue is that the road does not provide access to a large portion of the cemetery.










Figure 3. This version shows the road running parallel to the longer side of the cemetery boundary. This allows for more of the cemetery to be accessed by the road. However this requires the plots to be offset from a standard grid. Because of this, it is not as visually pleasing. If I did not choose to offset/ stagger the plots, it would waste a lot of space.

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