November 29, 2023
Use case
GOAT has come a long way, and with that, we’ve gained clarity on where we’re headed: towards a WebGIS platform enriched with planning intelligence. We’ve been working on GOAT for several years, starting in the academic world, where we focused on dynamic accessibility analyses for urban and transport planning through an interactive WebGIS interface. While this was rewarding work, it remained a specialized, niche topic. Even from the beginning, we sensed there was potential for something broader.
One of the main challenges with the previous version of GOAT was that its functionality was tightly linked to a rigid data structure and required preconfigured datasets. This made it difficult to scale both geographically and functionally. With GOAT v2, we’ve taken a significant step forward to address these limitations.
Over the past year, we’ve completely rewritten the application from the ground up, incorporating technical improvements (though I’ll resist diving too deep into the technical details here!). More importantly, we worked closely with our users and partners to assess the existing version. The conclusion was clear: GOAT should be accessible globally and versatile enough to support both traditional GIS applications and more complex indicators in urban, transport, and environmental planning.
GOAT v2 is a modern cloud-based GIS solution, enhanced by our expertise in developing indicators for urban, transport, and environmental studies. With its new functionalities, GOAT now supports a wider range of use cases, including real estate and research. We’ve introduced a modern user interface that follows best practices in web mapping while offering flexibility. Key features include dynamic, customizable layer styling, a dashboard for managing data, projects, and users, as well as integrated and custom data support, a comprehensive toolbox, scenario planning, and collaboration features.
GOAT v2 empowers users to seamlessly integrate their own data while taking advantage of the platform’s robust built-in datasets, giving you a comprehensive foundation for your analysis.
GOAT offers a growing catalog of valuable built-in datasets, including population statistics, administrative boundaries, street networks, and points of interest (POIs). These ready-to-use resources help you kickstart your analysis without the need for external data sourcing.
In addition to the built-in data, you can easily upload your own datasets in various file formats, including OGC services such as WFS and WMS. This feature ensures that GOAT adapts to your specific needs, allowing you to combine external data sources with GOAT’s core resources for richer analyses.
GOAT v2 seamlessly integrates with industry-standard geospatial data formats, including OGC standards. Our services also follow the Vector Tile and OGC Feature standards, ensuring compatibility and performance.
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GOAT v2 offers a powerful toolbox that allows users to create meaningful GIS analyses quickly, without sacrificing flexibility. Whether you're conducting accessibility studies or complex spatial analyses, GOAT’s toolbox provides all the tools you need.
GOAT v2 also enables advanced geoanalytics, allowing you to perform spatial operations such as data joins, filtering, and aggregation. These capabilities allow you to extract powerful insights from your geospatial data, making it easy to identify patterns and trends.
GOAT’s toolbox includes a variety of key indicators for accessibility, such as catchment areas, heatmaps, routing, and even the Swiss "ÖV-Güteklassen" metric for public transport quality. These tools enable users to analyze how accessible different areas are, helping to inform planning and decision-making.
One of the standout features of GOAT’s toolbox is its flexibility. Users can fully customize analyses and datasets to meet their specific needs, ensuring that GOAT adapts to the unique requirements of each project.
One of the cutting-edge features of GOAT v2 is the ability to create and analyze your own planning scenarios. Scenarios act as data patches that allow you to add, modify, or delete existing features within a dataset. This capability enables planners to model future changes and assess the impacts in real time.
With GOAT’s scenario-building tools, users can easily design interventions by sketching out new streets, modifying infrastructure, or editing existing data. This flexibility allows you to model potential future developments or urban changes with minimal effort.
Once scenarios are created, GOAT enables you to simulate the effects of these interventions. By comparing "before and after" outcomes, you can visualize and analyze the impacts of various changes, gaining deeper insights into how they will affect the environment or urban landscape.
GOAT v2 empowers planners to incorporate scenario results directly into decision-making processes. By relying on data-driven insights, you can confidently shape future plans and policies, ensuring more informed, sustainable choices for urban development and transport planning.
GOAT v2 makes it easy to collaborate with teams on shared projects and datasets, streamlining workflows and improving project outcomes. Whether you’re working within an organization or engaging with external stakeholders, GOAT ensures smooth, efficient teamwork.
GOAT’s collaboration tools allow you to set up teams and assign roles within your organization. With the ability to create shared environments, teams can work together seamlessly, ensuring that everyone has access to the right tools and data while maintaining control over project management.
Working on shared datasets and projects is easier than ever. GOAT v2 enables multiple users to contribute to the same project, delivering real-time results while ensuring data consistency. This makes it simple to track changes, maintain version control, and keep everyone aligned on project goals.
Boost public and stakeholder engagement by easily sharing your data and projects through shareable links. GOAT allows you to publish project insights or datasets to external parties, making it easier to gather feedback, inform decision-making, or increase transparency with the public.
At Plan4Better, we are continuously working to enhance the platform and expand its capabilities. Over the coming months, we aim to further extend our features, bringing even more power and flexibility to GOAT.
GOAT v2 provides a comprehensive range of standard WebGIS tools that allow you to efficiently manage and serve geospatial data. Whether it’s data visualization, spatial analysis, or sharing geospatial insights, GOAT simplifies the process while maintaining robust functionality.
GOAT puts powerful indicators and data at your fingertips, enabling you to perform advanced analyses with ease. With GOAT, you can go beyond traditional tasks and accomplish more complex, data-driven projects than you might have initially imagined.
The user interface in GOAT v2 is designed to be both playful and intuitive, ensuring that even complex geospatial workflows are easy to manage. The interface prioritizes user engagement, making it enjoyable to explore and analyze data.
As an open-source platform, GOAT offers transparency, and fosters trust among its users. For organizations with specific requirements, we also provide the flexibility to host GOAT on your own infrastructure, ensuring full control and customization.
Check our documentation, videos or attend a webinar to learn more. Our documentation offers detailed explanations, step-by-step guidelines and technical insights into the features of GOAT and our tutorial videos give you an hands-on view of the GOAT functionalities.
Sign up for a free 14-day demo of GOAT and experience the platform's full capabilities. Interested in bringing GOAT to your organization? We offer flexible, competitive pricing tailored to your needs. We'd love to hear your thoughts—reach out to us via email or social media with any feedback or questions. And subscribe to our newsletter if you want to stay up to date on our latest developments.
With the release of GOAT v2, we are not just launching an upgrade—we're opening the door to a more powerful, flexible, and intelligent WebGIS platform. Whether you're a planner looking for advanced accessibility tools, a researcher analyzing environmental impacts, or an organization seeking a customizable, transparent GIS solution, GOAT v2 is designed to meet your needs.
Our journey continues as we actively work to enhance and expand GOAT's capabilities, ensuring that it evolves alongside the needs of our users. We believe in the transformative potential of data-driven decision-making, and with GOAT v2, we’re empowering planners, researchers, and decision-makers to shape more sustainable, informed urban and transport landscapes.
Finally, we would like to give a big thank you to the entire team for their hard work on GOAT! We would also like to thank our partners for their continued support as well as our clients for their trust in us. This journey would never have been possible without all of you!
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Whether you need state-of-the-art GIS technology, extensive datasets or expert advice – we are ready to help you shape a sustainable and liveable future for our community.