12.2. Contiguity input (optional)

This section presents the optional contiguity definition input data file.

Table 12.12. Overview of expected sheets for contiguity input

Excel Sheet NameDescription
ContiguityList of identifiers for contiguities.
ContiguityLanguageNames of the contiguities in different languages. A translation may be missing. See Content of contiguitylanguage.
NeighbourhoodUnique code for a neighbourhood that is associated to a contiguity, a threshold and a comparator. The comparator shows if two UT are neighbours or not. See Content of neighbourhood.
NeighbourhoodNames of neighbourhoods for each language. A translation may be missing. See Content of neighbourhoodlanguage.
ContiguityZoningA distance matrix is available for one or several meshes. See Content of ContiguityZoning.
ContiguityAreaA distance matrix is available for one or several study areas. See Content of ContiguityArea.
UnitContiguityiEach line provides the code of two UT, following columns show the distance for Contiguity_IDi, the header cell of each contiguity column providing the identifier of this contiguity. See Content of UnitContiguity.

Following listing provides an example for each expected sheet describing a contiguity definition:

Contiguity.txt / Contiguity

This sheet must contain one column whose header cell is ID. Example: the following sample sets two possible computations for contiguity, distance-time matrixes will be available for a car and for a lorry.
Table 12.13. Sample input Contiguity sheet
ID
CAR
TRUCK

ContiguityLanguage.txt / ContiguityLanguage

This sheet must contain four columns whose header cells are CONTIGUITY_ID, Language_ID (see Note about expected languages identifiers), Contiguity_NAME (e.g. the name of this contiguity in this locale) and Contiguity_DESC (a description of this contiguity). Example:
Table 12.14. Sample input ContiguityLanguage sheet
Contiguity_IDLanguage_IDContiguity_NAMEContiguity_DESC
CARENcar timeTime between units by car (in minutes)
TRUCKENtruck timeTime between units on a truck (minutes)
CARFRtemps voitureTemps entre les unités en voiture (minutes)
TRUCKFRtemps camionTemps entre les unités en camion (minutes)

Neighbourhood.txt / Neighbourhood

This sheet must contain four columns whose header cells are Neighbourhood_ID (see Note about expected languages identifiers), Contiguity_ID, Distance and Comparator. Possible values for the Comparator cells are:

  • <

  • <=

  • ==

  • >=

  • >

Example:
Table 12.15. Sample input Neighbourhood sheet
Neighbourhood_IDContiguity_IDdistancecomparator
CAR <= 360CAR360<=
TRUCK <= 360TRUCK360<=
CAR <= 540CAR540<=
TRUCK <= 540TRUCK540<=
CAR <= 180CAR180<=
TRUCK <= 180TRUCK180<=

NeighbourhoodLanguage.txt / NeighbourhoodLanguage

This sheet must contain four columns whose header cells are Neighbourhood_ID, Language_ID (ISO-639 language in 2 digits, Neighbourhood_NAME (e.g the name of this neighbourhood) and Neighbourhood_DESC (e.g. a description of this neighbourhood). In the following example, neighbourhoods are translated in english (EN) and french (FR):
Table 12.16. Sample input NeighbourhoodLanguage sheet
Neighbourhood_IDLanguage_IDNeighbourhood_NAMENeighbourhood_DESC
CAR <= 360EN6h carUnits at less than 6 hours by car
TRUCK <= 360EN6h truckUnits at less than 6 hours on a truck
CAR <= 540EN9h carUnits at less than 9 hours by car
TRUCK <= 540EN9h truckUnits at less than 9 hours on a truck
CAR <= 180EN3h carUnits at less than 3 hours by car
TRUCK <= 180EN3h truckUnits at less than 3 hours on a truck
CAR <= 360FR6h de voitureUnités à moins de 6 heures en voiture
TRUCK <= 360FR6h de camionUnités à moins de 6 heures en camion
CAR <= 540FR9h voitureUnités à moins de 9 heures en voiture
TRUCK <= 540FR9h de camionUnités à moins de 9 heures en camion
CAR <= 180FR3h de voitureUnités à moins de 3 heures en voiture
TRUCK <= 180FR3h de camionUnités à moins de 3 heures en voiture

ContiguityZoning.txt / ContiguityZoning

This sheet must contain two columns whose header cells are Contiguity_ID and Zoning_ID. In the following example, the distance-time by car and distance-time by lorry are available for NUTS_2 zoning only:
Table 12.17. Sample input ContiguityZoning sheet
Contiguity_IDZoning_ID
CARNuts_2
TRUCKNuts_2

[Important]

The identifiers that are given in the Zoning_ID column must be coherent with the identifiers that have been given in the Zoning sheet of the structure input, see Content of zoning.

ContiguityArea.txt / ContiguityArea

This sheet must contain two columns whose header cells are Contiguity_ID and Area_ID. In the following example, distance-time matrixes by car are available for UE15 and UE25, distance-time matrixes by lorry are available for UE27 and UE29:
Table 12.18. Sample input ContiguityArea sheet
Contiguity_IDArea_ID
CARUE15
CARUE25
TRUCKUE27
TRUCKUE29

[Important]

The identifiers that are given in the Area_ID column must be coherent with the identifiers that have been given in the Area sheet of the structure input, see Content of area.

UnitContiguity.txt / UnitContiguityi

This sheet must contain at least three columns whose header cells are UT_ID1, UT_ID2, then the identifier of a contiguity.. In the following example, contiguities between units are performed for CAR contiguity and TRUCK contiguity:
Table 12.19. Sample input UnitContiguity sheet
UT_ID1UT_ID2CARTRUCK
ES12UKC11265.111820.5
ES13UKC11138.851649.5
ES21UKC11058.921529.9

[Important]

In Excel mode, each UnitContiguity can only contain 216 rows, e.g. 65536. Several sheets can be created to import more results: just name your sheets UnitContiguity1, UnitContiguity2, etc. Note that only 30 UnitContiguityi sheets can be created. Nevertheless, on considering a symetric relationship for a distance between two units (e.g. distance between UT1 and UT2 equals the distance between UT2 and UT1), the number of needed rows can quasi be reduced by half. Thus, the number S of needed sheets for n units can be found by executing the formula which is shown on Figure 12.1:

Figure 12.1. Number S of needed sheets for n units

Number S of needed sheets for n units

S is the number of needed sheets, n is the number of units. On the numerator, "1 +" stands for the header row that must be included on each sheet.


Note that contiguities are not aggregable: a distance matrix is set for a given level of mesh. For its upper level, the associated distance matrix must also be given. Table 12.20 provides an example of the number of needed sheets for different levels with several numbers of units.

Table 12.20. Example of needed sheets number

MeshNumber of UT (n)Number of sheets (S)
NUTS_0291
NUTS_1921
NUTS_22802
NUTS_2_37275
NUTS_3132914
Total23