a few things

1. You have a lot of people still in "district 0". If you expand the "tools" bar at the top, there is a button marked "find unassigned districts" and when clicked will zoom in on them one at a time.

2. It looks like you're trying to create a bunch of Dem districts by unpacking Chicago but it's hard to tell without ethnic data for the districts and 2008 county vote data. The only two obviously red districts are the light-brown one on the west side and the light green one in the south. I'm not sure about the neon-green one north of St. Louis or the dark purple one next to it.

41, Ind, CA-05

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by: sacman701 @ Wed Mar 02, 2011 at 23:17:59 PM UTC

Oh ok!

I was looking for the "find unassigned districts" button.

19, Self Appointed Chair of the SSP Gay Caucus (I claimed it first :p), male, Dem, IN-09 (College IN-09) (Raised IL-03, IL-09)

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by: ndrwmls10 @ Wed Mar 02, 2011 at 23:20:57 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Same here!

I am working on filling in all the unassigned districts before I adjust my California Senate map in order to make my Assembly map and it's taking me forrreeever.

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28, New Democrat, Female, TX-03 (hometown CA-26)

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by: californianintexas @ Thu Mar 03, 2011 at 03:09:25 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Yeah I tried messing with California

and gave up. Such a difficult task you have.

19, Self Appointed Chair of the SSP Gay Caucus (I claimed it first :p), male, Dem, IN-09 (College IN-09) (Raised IL-03, IL-09)

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by: ndrwmls10 @ Thu Mar 03, 2011 at 03:21:52 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Finding those unassinged districts there

Takes forever and is absolutely impossible.  

for more election analysis, visit  http://frogandturtle.blogspot....

17, CA-06,  

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by: Alibguy @ Thu Mar 03, 2011 at 15:24:32 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

It might be easier now

With Ctrl-drag. Just drag a box over the entire problem county (usually Contra Costa and El Dorado) and color in the whole thing. Then you can go back and split the county into multiple districts if you like.

There is no cure, unfortunately, for the weird thing in Santa Clara and Kern that links precincts hundreds of miles away.

20, CD MA-03/NH-01/MA-08

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by: MassGOP @ Thu Mar 03, 2011 at 16:03:06 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Sure there is

Don't use the voting district map as your primary map. If I understand correctly, the demographics are thought to be less accurate than the census block one with ACS updates, and the political data is something the commission isn't supposed to be taking into account. It's a pain to have to draw the map twice to get political data after-the-fact, but you get a prettier, more accurate, and more-true-to-the-process map.

30, male, MI-11 (previously VA-08). Evangelical, postconservative, green.

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by: borodino21 @ Thu Mar 03, 2011 at 18:08:58 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Thanks a bunch for that first tip!

I got all the uncolored districts in my CA State Senate map colored finally, and in about half the time I usually take. Now I can finish my CA Board of Equalization map!

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28, New Democrat, Female, TX-03 (hometown CA-26)

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by: californianintexas @ Fri Mar 04, 2011 at 04:02:35 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

I was trying to create as many Democratic districts as possible.

I have no idea if I succeeded or not.

19, Self Appointed Chair of the SSP Gay Caucus (I claimed it first :p), male, Dem, IN-09 (College IN-09) (Raised IL-03, IL-09)

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by: ndrwmls10 @ Fri Mar 04, 2011 at 00:48:20 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Illinois is tricky

given the following

1) Dems control everything

BUT

2) Chicago lost population... and the suburbs boomed

3) but almost all the suburban boom has been Hispanic migrants.  

It would help to have partisan numbers in Dave's redistricting application before the State Legislature starts the ball rolling on redistricting, which will be as early as next month if news reports are to be believed.  (Under state law they have to have a redistricting law signed before July 1 before it falls to a non-partisan commission to draw the map, with the infamous name drawn out of the Abe Lincoln stovepipe hat).  Yes, we indeed do things really funny in the Land of Lincoln!!

But in the meantime, I am playing with Obama 08 and Quinn 10 numbers.  That gives a very good Democratic year where Democrats overperformed in the suburbs, and a very good Republican year, where Quinn won entirely because of Chicago and lost badly (but not too badly) in the burbs.  I think averaging the two will give a rough approximation of Democratic strength out in the burbs (or at least the range of possible outcomes).  

I think given that Chicago has lost population, and particularly teh South Side and the West Side, and given the need to probably draw two Hispanic VRA seats, a 12-6 or at most a 13-5 map is the most we can hope for.  Even a 12-6 map would still mean four more seats than Democrats currently hold, which would be a mean achievement.  But I am going to try for a 13-5 (Shimkus/Johnson in the south), (Schock/Tea Party guy who took over the 17th), Manzullo/Tea Party guy who took out Melissa Bean, put a fourth district going from Urbana-Champaign north to outer Chicago exurbs to grab all those Republican voters, and a 5th district in Du Page.  Then I think if you create a cities district linking Peoria, Springfield, Decatur, and U-C you have a new Democratic seat in the central part of the state.  Ditto with Rock Island and Rockford.  And then you can have fingers reaching out to DeKalb and NIU, Aurora could be put into the new 2nd Hispanic seat so not to weaken Lipinski (who has to be favored by Madigan so he will get treated with kid gloves), and then you could give Elgin to a new seat going to Waukegan to elect Melissa Bean if she wants to come back.

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by: jsramek @ Sat Mar 05, 2011 at 03:03:02 AM UTC