Matt Stiles // The Daily Viz

Ryan Murphy at The Texas Tribune created this awesome mapping feature that allows users to search their addresses to see how their representation in the U.S. House may have changed during redistricting. 

Before: Our house in south Austin was represented by U.S. Rep. Lloyd Doggett, a Democrat: 

After: Now our house is represented by Rep. Lamar Smith, a Republican: 

I ditched the BlackBerry two years ago this week. Here’s where I’ve been since my iPhone started logging my travel coordinates (56,000 records and counting): 

Built with Fusion Tables. 

An interactive map from work: 

This map visualizes the number of years officials have served in the U.S. House of Representatives, with darker shades representing longer seniority. Toggle the map below to see the members’ political affiliations (red=Republicans; blue=Democrats). Read a related story.

Source: U.S. House Clerk | Data: CSV

Inspired by FlowingData’s post, I mapped world gas prices by gallon in U.S. dollars. Gas is most expensive Turkey ($9.69) and The Netherlands ($9.01), where my mother in law lives and drives. It’s least expensive in Venezuela (9 cents) and Saudi Arabia (61 cents), two oil-rich states that surely subsidize the cost for locals. 

(View larger interactive version)

Source: Wikipedia | Date: CSV | Made with Google Fusion Tables

Using data collected by the U.S. Geological Survey, anyone can download historical data on earthquakes across the globe in various formats. Here’s a screenshot in Google Earth from a KML file downloaded today. It shows 30 years of earthquakes — in this extent focused on Japan — with colors representing depth and bubble size representing magnitude. (This obviously looks better in Google Earth):

Here’s an interactive version of the KML data uploaded to Google Fusion Tables:

View larger version | Source: USGS | Download the data

The percentage of Facebook users by state as of Dec. 2009 (darker shades represent higher rates of usage):

Sources: Google Fusion Tables, U.S. Census Bureau | Data

The Washington, D.C., official data catalog is a rich source for information about the nation’s capitol. Users can download dozens of free GIS products as well as datasets related to city functions (311 service requests, permits, etc.) in relatively clean tables.

For today’s visualization I downloaded some 31,000 serious crime incidents in 2010, and then uploaded them to Google Fusion Tables, a free online database manager with powerful querying and visualization tools. The data were already geocoded, so I filtered the table for homicides and made this simple map (click the photo to see a full-screen interactive version): 

View an interactive map with all crimes, not just homicides. 

Sources: D.C. Data Catalog, Google Fusion Tables | Raw Data: CSV