Method and system for counting households within a geographic area
First Claim
1. A method of counting households within a geographic region utilizing at least one geographic information service (GIS) database, a preprocessing routine, a primary build routine, a seasonal build routine, and a merge routine, wherein the primary build routine, seasonal build routine, and merge routine are in communication with the GIS database, the method comprising the steps of:
- (a) receiving as input at the at least one GIS database a plurality of data sets, wherein each of the data sets comprises a plurality of households, wherein each of the plurality of households is either a non-seasonal household or a seasonal household, wherein at least one of the plurality of households is a non-seasonal household and at least one of the plurality of households is a seasonal household, and wherein each of the households is associated with a geographic sub-region within the region, and further wherein each geographic sub-region is further divisible into at least one sub-sub-region;
(b) calculating at the preprocessing routine a set of geographic correspondences between the sub-regions of at least two of the plurality of data sets;
(c) utilizing at the primary build routine the set of geographic correspondences to allocate the non-seasonal households from at least one of the plurality of data sets to at least one of the geographic sub-regions, wherein the allocation step is performed by one of a plurality of models, and further wherein the plurality of models comprises at least one of a postal delivery statistics model, a postal-to-census-data boundary overlap model, and a need-allocation model;
(d) calculating an actual need for at least one of the geographic sub-regions, wherein said actual need includes a weighting factor which determines a proportion of seasonal households to be allocated to the at least one geographic sub-regions;
(e) utilizing at the seasonal build routine the set of geographic correspondences to incrementally allocate the seasonal households to at least one of the geographic sub-regions based on the calculated actual need;
(f) merging at the merge routine the results of the steps of allocating the number of non-seasonal and seasonal households; and
(g) allocating the seasonal and non-seasonal households to each of the sub-sub-regions within each sub-region.
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Abstract
A method and system for providing an accurate count of total households and seasonal households within a defined geographic area is disclosed. The invention has application in, for example, the identification of potential sites for retail business locations. The invention utilizes additional data sources beyond census data in order to provide more accurate household counts, particularly in high-growth areas when census data has become stale. Seasonal households may be counted by the use of household data containing spatially inconsistent records (SIRs), that is, records for which the best address does not match the location where the telephone service is provided. Households for which an exact address is not known are allocated within the geographic area of interest according to various spreading models.
12 Citations
24 Claims
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1. A method of counting households within a geographic region utilizing at least one geographic information service (GIS) database, a preprocessing routine, a primary build routine, a seasonal build routine, and a merge routine, wherein the primary build routine, seasonal build routine, and merge routine are in communication with the GIS database, the method comprising the steps of:
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(a) receiving as input at the at least one GIS database a plurality of data sets, wherein each of the data sets comprises a plurality of households, wherein each of the plurality of households is either a non-seasonal household or a seasonal household, wherein at least one of the plurality of households is a non-seasonal household and at least one of the plurality of households is a seasonal household, and wherein each of the households is associated with a geographic sub-region within the region, and further wherein each geographic sub-region is further divisible into at least one sub-sub-region; (b) calculating at the preprocessing routine a set of geographic correspondences between the sub-regions of at least two of the plurality of data sets; (c) utilizing at the primary build routine the set of geographic correspondences to allocate the non-seasonal households from at least one of the plurality of data sets to at least one of the geographic sub-regions, wherein the allocation step is performed by one of a plurality of models, and further wherein the plurality of models comprises at least one of a postal delivery statistics model, a postal-to-census-data boundary overlap model, and a need-allocation model; (d) calculating an actual need for at least one of the geographic sub-regions, wherein said actual need includes a weighting factor which determines a proportion of seasonal households to be allocated to the at least one geographic sub-regions; (e) utilizing at the seasonal build routine the set of geographic correspondences to incrementally allocate the seasonal households to at least one of the geographic sub-regions based on the calculated actual need; (f) merging at the merge routine the results of the steps of allocating the number of non-seasonal and seasonal households; and (g) allocating the seasonal and non-seasonal households to each of the sub-sub-regions within each sub-region. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24)
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Specification