MapBees

MapBees
Author:	Tinkal Gogoi
License:	Proprietary (Free Tier)
Platform:	Web
Status:	Active
Language:	English
Website:	https://mapbees.com
Programming languages:	TypeScript, Go, and Python
Web map for location analysis that scores every hex of a city on open data (OpenStreetMap, Overture Maps, national censuses) with named formulas you can check.
Features Feature Value Map Display Display map yes Map data vector Source online Rotate map no 3D view no Shows website no Shows phone number no Shows operation hours no Routing Routing no Create route manually ? Calculate route ? Create route via Waypoints ? Routing profiles ? Turn restrictions ? Calculate route without Internet (Offline routing) ? Routing providers ? Avoid traffic ? Traffic Provider ? Navigating Navigate no Find location no Find nearby POIs yes Navigate to point ? Navigation with voice / Voice guidance ? Keep on road ? Lane guidance ? Works without GPS ? Navigate along predefined route ? Tracking Make track no Customizable log interval ? Track formats ? Geotagging ? Fast POI buttons ? Upload GPX to OSM ? Monitoring ? Editing Add POIs no Edit / Delete POIs no Add way no Edit geometries no Edit arbitrary tags of existing OSM objects no Edit relations no View notes no Create notes no Edit notes ? Work offline ? Support imagery offset DB ? Upload to OSM no Rendering ? Accessibility ?

MapBees is a web app for location analysis built on open data, including OpenStreetMap. It divides a city into hexes (a hex is one hexagon on the map, about 350 m across; technically an H3 resolution 9 cell) and draws a map of them with a named formula: a weighted Score, how much of something each hex has, whether a hex has more than its fair share compared with the city average, how many are missing, or whether a busy or quiet patch of the map is more than chance. It is used to choose where to open a business, to plan sales territories and to compare neighborhoods.

MapBees reads OpenStreetMap data; it does not edit it. OpenStreetMap data is part of:

• the outlines of most cities and neighborhoods (neighborhoods name hexes and Standouts)
• the buildings, streets, footpaths and land use that hexes are measured on
• the background map, credited on the map

Other data is not from OpenStreetMap. Places (shops, cafés, schools, transit stops) come from the Overture Maps places data, and resident, household and income figures come from each country's census, always named with source and year (for example Zensus 2022 in Germany, ONS Census 2021 in the United Kingdom, US Census 2020 (NHGIS) in the United States). A census figure shown for a hex is an estimate for that hex.

Compared with desktop GIS, the data for each city is already loaded, every map type is a named method with plain-language controls, and any hex can be opened to see how its number was made. Scout Bee, the AI map assistant, can also set up a map from a question typed in plain English.

Features

Map types

Each map type is a named method; the field's own term is shown beside its plain name.

• Score: every hex scored 0–100 on weighted factors, each with an importance and a More is better / Less is better direction.
• Amount: how much of one measure is in each hex.
• Variety: how mixed a set of kinds of place is in each hex (Simpson / Shannon index), or how many of the set's kinds are present.
• Fair share: a measure compared with an average, where 1× is the average (location quotient). The average can be the city's, a drawn area's, or that of all the cities MapBees covers in the same country.
• Missing: how many of something are missing compared with what the rate predicts (gap analysis), with the same choice of averages.
• Clusters: whether a busy or quiet patch of the map is more than chance (Getis-Ord Gi* hot spots and cold spots). Also show the odd ones out adds hexes that are Busy among quiet or Quiet among busy.
• Cross two: two measures per hex on one 3×3 color grid (bivariate map).

Measures

• Five groups: Places (more than 1,300 kinds in 14 categories), Building volume by building type, Population & age, Affluence, and Accessibility (transit stops, pedestrian street length, parking, EV charging, bike-share, car rental, taxi stands, fuel stations).
• Count as: a measure can be shown as a total, per 1 000 residents, per km², as a share of its category, or per a base the city's census publishes, such as per 1 000 households or per 1 000 residents 65 and over.
• Within a 10-minute walk: read a hex together with the hexes within a 10-minute walk around it.
• Your data: add a CSV file of your own points (with lat and lon columns, or an h3 column) and map how many are in each hex, or the sum or average of a number in the file. The file stays in your browser.

Narrowing a map

• Only where …: a map of one measure can be drawn only where up to three conditions hold, such as no pharmacies within a 10-minute walk or Residents at least 2,000. Hexes that miss a condition are muted, not removed (not on Clusters).
• Range: a minimum and maximum on a measure, in values or in % of the city's hexes (3,000–4,500, top 20% of hexes). Hexes outside it are hidden, or, for a Score factor, can instead be given fewer points.

Reading a map

• Hex details: click a hex to see the points each factor added to its Score (30 of 33), where the hex stands among the city's hexes, and plain counts in the hex and within a 10-minute walk.
• Standouts: ranked groups of nearby high-scoring hexes, outlined on the map and named after their neighborhood.
• Same pattern: the measures that rise and fall with a chosen measure across the city's hexes, said as very closely, closely or somewhat. It is a fact about where things are, not a cause.
• Usually nearby: the kinds of place within a 10-minute walk of one kind more often than across the city (Bakery 42% · 2.1×).
• Stated color cuts: equal share of hexes, even value steps, natural breaks, against the city's own figure, or Auto, which says which cut it picked.
• Method card: under Show the math, a copyable summary of the map in words, its map id, the method version (Method 1.0) and the sources with their years.

Questions

• Scout Bee: type a question such as "where should I open a café?"; Scout Bee proposes a map, says which formula it chose and why, and offers other readings of the question. It only moves controls the user also has, and every change can be undone.
• Question Library: ready-made questions to start from, such as Everyday needs (how many of six everyday kinds of place, from grocery store to pharmacy, are within a 10-minute walk) and Out of reach: pharmacies (residents with no pharmacy within a 10-minute walk).

Territory and market share

• Territory: catchments by drive, walk, cycle or transit time from a pin, a radius or a drawn area, with the overlap between territories shown. Catchment bands nest several travel times from one pin, and Rush hour shows how much a drive catchment shrinks at busy times of a typical week.
• Market share: place your stores and competitor stores and estimate captured, contested and cannibalized demand with a Huff gravity model; export to CSV.

Places and links

• Places: draw the places themselves as pins over any map, picked by category and kind; a place factor's Show these places switch draws exactly the places it counts.
• Copy link: every map is a link that reopens exactly the same map.

Usage

MapBees runs in a web browser. There is nothing to install, and the map works without an account.

1. Open mapbees.com/app and pick a city.
2. Pick a map type, start from a question in the Question Library, or type a question to Scout Bee.
3. For a Score, choose the factors and how important each one is; the map updates as you change them.
4. Click a hex to open Hex details and see how its number was made.
5. Use Copy link to save or share exactly this map.

Help

• The MapBees blog works through each formula on a London example.
• Questions, bugs and data problems: feedback form.

Contribute

MapBees is closed source. There are two ways to help:

• Improve OpenStreetMap. Improvements to OpenStreetMap in a covered city reach MapBees over time, as that city's data is refreshed.
• Report problems, such as a wrong neighborhood name, a missing city or a map that looks wrong, through the feedback form.

Privacy Policy

The map works without an account. MapBees processes basic request data, such as browser information, to run and secure the service, and collects aggregated product analytics. Questions typed to Scout Bee are sent to the MapBees server, which uses a hosted AI model to answer them. A file added under Your data is read in your browser and kept in your browser's own storage; MapBees never stores it. Each map request that reads it carries only its hexes and their numbers, which the server holds in memory while it draws the map. Full text: MapBees Privacy Policy.

See also

• Overture Maps

External links

• Official website
• The map
• Blog
• Terms of Service and data sources
• MapBees on LinkedIn
• MapBees on X