On the third day of Dashboard Week, we were given the task to work with relatively clean spatial data from the City of Melbourne and had the freedom to choose what to focus on. As an aunt with two young nephews who love playgrounds, I knew I had to create a Tableau dashboard that would allow us to easily decide which playground to meet at. Since my family lives on the Surf Coast, I also needed to ensure that the dashboard included information on parking availability for each playground within 300 meters.
To accomplish this, I used two data sets from the City of Melbourne’s open data source: playgrounds and on-street parking bays. Initially, the Alteryx workflow appeared to be straightforward, but I faced challenges when trying to use playground features as a parameter in Tableau. Fortunately, trainer Ross was able to show me how to use a text input tool and find replace in Alteryx to remove all the full stops before splitting the features column into rows. With a summarise tool, I was able to output the feature field and create a parameter for the playground features in Tableau. Ross also showed me how to join on spatial (again!), which was incredibly helpful.
With the data ready, I began putting together the map, experimenting with maps on mapbox and finding one called Frank that I used as the background map in Tableau. I also got creative with the process, using images in Excalidraw to act as my legends instead of Tableau chart and map legends.
Overall, I am thrilled with the outcome of my dashboard for day 3 of Dashboard Week. It’s the perfect tool for my family to find the best playgrounds in Melbourne.
