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Trade Area Tool Icon Trade Area Tool

One Tool Example

Trade Area has a One Tool Example. Go to Sample Workflows to learn how to access this and many other examples directly in Alteryx Designer.

Use Trade Area to create regions around specified point objects in the input file. Trade Areas are created in one of two ways: either by defining a radius around a point or by a drivetime.

Important

The Guzzler drivetime engine must be installed to use the drivetime creation.

If you use DriveTime, go to Guzzler Drivetime Methodology for more information.

Configure the Tool

  1. Spatial Object Field of Point Source: Use the dropdown list to specify the spatial object field from the input table, to draw a trade area from/around. The Trade Area tool draws a polygon around a point, so if a different object type is specified (polygon or polyline), the object's centroid is treated as the specified point. You can also select Include in Output to include the point in the output data stream.

  2. Radius, Doughnuts or Drivetime: There are two options.

    • Enter a Specific Value: for the trade area radii or drivetime.

    • Values can be separated by a comma or dash to indicate concentric rings, also known as doughnuts, be drawn.

    • Example: "5, 10, 15" creates concentric trade areas in 5, 10, 15 increments; 5-10, 15-20 creates doughnut trade areas.

    • Use From Field: to select a field that contains corresponding drivetime values per record

  3. Specify the Units to apply to the increments specified above. Choices include Radius (Miles), Radius (Kilometers), or Drivetime Minutes.

  4. If Drive time polygons in minutes are to be drawn, the user can specify the dataset they wish to use to calculate this figure. If only one dataset is installed, you do not have the option to select another dataset. You can specify the default dataset from User Settings. Go to Options > User Settings and select the Tools tab. Next, use the Dataset Defaults section to make your selections.

  5. Eliminate Overlap: Select to eliminate overlapping regions when all points have the same radius, ensuring no trade area occupies the same space. The resulting regions are also known as Voronoi polygons. This option is not available when either of the following are selected:

Note

While using spatial tools, you might have more than one spatial object field in the data stream. When you are configuring the final Output Data tool, you must remember that output to files such as.dbf,.xls or.csv will not accept the spatial object fields, and that spatial files only one spatial object field. Use the Select tool to select only the appropriate fields for the output file type.

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