Traffic Accident Severity Visualizer
Lauren Dulick, Samantha Bennett, Trevor Gross
Overview
Within the scope of this project, our group’s objective was to create visual representations of regions across the mainland United States that experienced elevated car crash rates during the year 2022. The primary aim was to provide drivers with insightful information, enabling them to recognize areas posing the highest risk for road accidents. By identifying these hazardous areas, our goal was to encourage drivers to exercise heightened caution and vigilance, ultimately fostering a safer driving experience in future years.
Project Specifications
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Utilize two data structures to visualize car accident data in a unique way
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Adjacency List
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Max Heap
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Comparison of the two data structures and their respective utilizations
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Calculate the two structures' time complexities
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Read in data from a CSV file (~7 million data points)
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Filter through CSV file to gather accidents from 2022 (~1.7 million data points)
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Allow user interaction through the API and a computer mouse
Design Process
The two data structures we elected to implement with algorithms were a max heap and an adjacency list. We compared the two by recording the execution times required to build the map, displayed on the bottom right of the screen. Our project involved the utilization of multiple programming languages, namely C++, HTML, JavaScript, and CSS. To display the map of the USA, we utilized the Leaflet JavaScript API and the JSON library for modern C++. To work on the code as a team, we employed GitHub, pushing and pulling code to and from each other, as well as Visual Studio as our group’s IDE.
Elements
Features implemented in our project include a 2D map of the United States, a legend containing several buttons changing the display of the map, a use of the computer’s mouse, and an information panel displaying the name of the county selected as well as all of that county’s accident information. With regards to the mouse, the user may hover over a county to see details regarding the car crashes in that county. In addition, the user may select a county to zoom in. A user may also click any button in the legend to change the data displayed on the map. The buttons include: Reset Map, Severity, Crossing, Junction, Signal, Stop, Day, Night, Visibility (miles), Fair (Weather), Cloudy (Weather), Foggy (Weather), Rainy (Weather), and Snowy (Weather).
