PolyMaps and GeoCommons Data

Final Demo: US Ski Resorts on PolyMaps

PolyMaps is a free JavaScript library for making dynamic maps using tiled vector data in spherical mercator projection. In other words you get a full-fledged slippy maps (image tiles, pan, zoom, etc) library that works with SVG. This is very similar to my geo example with D3, but D3 is more of a visualization library with geographical capabilities while PolyMaps is more focused on just mapping. PolyMaps has nice documentation and examples, and it was a breeze to create a simple map.

Now, lets add some data. I have mentioned GeoCommons before, but I wanted to show how easy it is to find and visualize some interesting data sets from GeoCommons. You could just upload some data to GeoCommons and let them create a map for you but we are going to browse the website for uploaded geo data and make our own map. PolyMaps uses GeoJSON and GeoCommons allows you to transform their data sets into various formats so lets get started.
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