Love this! I just got back from Tokyo and was thinking something similar about what determined the density of which brands. Nice work!
Show HN: Interactive map of the convenience store "turf war" in Japan
21–30 of 59 posts
Re: Show HN: Interactive map of the convenience store "turf war" in Japan
#22At first I struggled to make sense of the numbers in the circles. Surely there can't be 10,110 locations in a space the size of the SF Bay area? But yes, yes there are...
One thing that struck me when visiting Tokyo (as an American living in San Francisco), was that it was not uncommon to go to a restaurant or bar on, say the 3rd or 4th floor of a building. In America and Europe, restaurants and shops are basically all zoned to be on the ground floor, with residential or office units above. This gives the density a different feeling, because commercial/dining space extends upward.
THIS! I was just talking to a city council member about my trip to Japan and how this level of density (multiple stores in the same location vertically but not horizontally) Had some interesting effects on walkability, sales tax revenue per sq mile, and mixed use residential.
Re: Show HN: Interactive map of the convenience store "turf war" in Japan
#23Earlier quoted context omitted.
One thing that struck me when visiting Tokyo (as an American living in San Francisco), was that it was not uncommon to go to a restaurant or bar on, say the 3rd or 4th floor of a building. In America and Europe, restaurants and shops are basically all zoned to be on the ground floor, with residential or office units above. This gives the density a different feeling, because commercial/dining space extends upward.
Oh, interesting point. So when I see a marker on every block in places, that doesn't mean you can just walk off the street into them, they might be upstairs?
Convenience stores are almost always ground floor. I can only think of times where there is a mezzanine or similar that they might be on an upper floor. They are always placed to have high foot or vehicle traffic.
Re: Show HN: Interactive map of the convenience store "turf war" in Japan
#24On my recent first trip to Japan, I couldn't believe the number and quality of 7-Elevens/Family Marts/Lawsons. You're never more than a five-minute walk from one in Tokyo, and they've got good stuff.
Unfortunately, a side effect of the devaluation of the yen is that food quality at conbinis has decreased as they try to maintain price points. I recently spent a few weeks in Tokyo and there was noticeable difference in quality versus a few years ago.
Re: Show HN: Interactive map of the convenience store "turf war" in Japan
#25Earlier quoted context omitted.
One thing that struck me when visiting Tokyo (as an American living in San Francisco), was that it was not uncommon to go to a restaurant or bar on, say the 3rd or 4th floor of a building. In America and Europe, restaurants and shops are basically all zoned to be on the ground floor, with residential or office units above. This gives the density a different feeling, because commercial/dining space extends upward.
Oh, interesting point. So when I see a marker on every block in places, that doesn't mean you can just walk off the street into them, they might be upstairs?
[deleted]
Re: Show HN: Interactive map of the convenience store "turf war" in Japan
#26Earlier quoted context omitted.
Oh, interesting point. So when I see a marker on every block in places, that doesn't mean you can just walk off the street into them, they might be upstairs?
Convenience stores are almost always ground floor. I can only think of times where there is a mezzanine or similar that they might be on an upper floor. They are always placed to have high foot or vehicle traffic.
Exceptions would be places like railway stations, where there might be more people on a different level.
Re: Show HN: Interactive map of the convenience store "turf war" in Japan
#27I need to see if I can modify this to finally make my ‘inaka or not’ map by determining the distance to the closest combini. I can’t quite use this one as the radius for every store seems to be a bit large.
Ill post the backend code to the github soon, and there you could easily change the diameter of influence each store has.
Re: Show HN: Interactive map of the convenience store "turf war" in Japan
#28This is really excellent UI. One suggestion. When zooming in, eventually the stores turn into a uniform blue dot. A light blue icon. I'd like to see the individual icons keep the color of the convenience store when zoomed in. Know the map color changes, but it isn't as obvious as the icon. There is bit of a disjoint in how my eye is tracking the colors where some icons are still a color of the store, but some have tu…
Good feedback, I will see what I can do. I agree, I originally wanted to also use logo based icons.
Re: Show HN: Interactive map of the convenience store "turf war" in Japan
#29At first I struggled to make sense of the numbers in the circles. Surely there can't be 10,110 locations in a space the size of the SF Bay area? But yes, yes there are...
One thing that struck me when visiting Tokyo (as an American living in San Francisco), was that it was not uncommon to go to a restaurant or bar on, say the 3rd or 4th floor of a building. In America and Europe, restaurants and shops are basically all zoned to be on the ground floor, with residential or office units above. This gives the density a different feeling, because commercial/dining space extends upward.
In the US, Chicago is also like this. I've been to a "shopping mall" that had ten stores but was spread among four floors.
Makes it hard to believe Americans when they claim their city is "very dense" when it is mostly single story buildings surrounded by parking lots.
Re: Show HN: Interactive map of the convenience store "turf war" in Japan
#30The colors, while legible, are breaking my eyes. Other than that, great visualization. Fanastc work.