Issue
I want to create boundary files for my police force area or local authority districts
Solution
KeyACCIDENT has embedded boundaries, sourced from the Open Geography Portal of the Office for National Statistics
These boundaries are used in background location validation, but you can also create them as boundary files (.BRY) for use with geographic searches
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Find available files in the KeyACCIDENT Database module
Tools > Manage Boundaries
The list may take several minutes to populate, depending on network speeds
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The list shows LA Districts, then Police Force Areas in alphabetical order
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Select the boundary and click Export to file (top right)
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Save the file in a suitable location
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You can now bring this BRY file into the KeyACCIDENT GIS module with Load Boundary and search on them using Existing Search
Note: if you get an error searching the boundary first time:
- Close the search wizard
- Use Existing Search again
Tip: you may find it helpful to turn off “Show grips” when working with these files – they can have thousands of nodes and be time-consuming to select or re-order vertically
OPTIONS > deselect Show grips > OK
If you turn off Show grips, you must turn it back on to work with collision plots and diagrams
Importing boundary files
This can be done using the ONS GeoJSON files:
- These must be in the ONS format
- Currently, they must use grid coordinates and not latitude/longitude
- You may need some technical assistance to adjust the files to work
Case study: Import ONS GeoJSON has been used to create secondary school catchments areas for Warwickshire, which can now be used with the Site Monitoring tool
ONS GeoJSON files
If downloading boundaries form the Open Geography Portal of the Office for National Statistics, we recommend that the BFE format is most suitable
Other formats have lower accuracy and do not always adjoin completely