Tile Grid Maps: Creating Spatial Small Multiples

Traditional maps can be misleading as they let large, empty regions dominate the view while small, dense areas disappear. Tile grid maps solve this by using a consistent grid of squares or hexagons to represent areas. In addition, this approach allows you to draw chart types in a spatial context.

In this lesson, you’ll learn to abstract geography into a gridusing the geofacet package and custom shapefiles. You’ll practice creating spatial small multiples that visualize complex data across regions without the geographic bias of a standard map.