The Isochrones macro can be used to create reachable areas based on travel time (sometimes referred to as 'trade areas').
If you haven't already installed the macro, you can download it from the Alteryx Gallery here
To use the macro, drag it onto an Alteryx workflow from the TravelTime Platform tab in the top navigation.
Next we need to connect to some input data. This can be done either by connecting to a file using the Input Data tool, or by entering data manually using the Text Input tool.
In the example below we are using the Text Input tool.
If your location data is in the form of addresses (e.g Postcodes) and not lat-long coordinates, then you can use our Geocoder macro to make this conversion first, before using the Isochrones macro.
To configure the macro you first need to enter your API key details in the Credentials tab of the tool configuration.
If you don't already have a TravelTime API key, you can sign up for free here.
On the Configuration tab we select the fields in the input data that contain the Latitude and Longitude values, set whether we want to run an 'Arriving By' or 'Departing At' search, and enter the travel time(s) to be used to create the reachable areas.
As with the majority of the parameters in the TravelTime macros, the travel time can also be selected based on a field in the input data.
On the next tab, Basic, we choose the method(s) of transport (ticking multiple with create an isochrone around each input location for each selected transport type), and the date/time.
For an 'Arriving By' search, this date/time is the arrival time. For a 'Departing At' search, this date/time is the departure time.
Finally, the parameters in the Advanced tab can be used to fine-tune the analysis if required.
These Advanced fields only apply to transport types that involve public transport. For a full explanation of what each field means, please see the documentation here.
Adding a Browse tool to both output anchors, the workflow below can now be run:
Adding a base map to the Browse tool from the success anchor allows all of the isochrones to be viewed on one map:
The output table contains one row per isochrone, with the parameters appended to the data. Clicking a row highlights the corresponding isochrone on the map.
For any records that cause an error, details of the error can be found in the Failure output anchor, including the Error Code and links to more information.
These isochrones can easily be exported and then visualised further in Tableau - to find out more, read our blog post here.