Q: How do I geocode a list of addresses using Google Fusion Tables?
Answer
Google Fusion Tables provides an easy alternative to other geocoding methods. Using the same parsing methods as Google Maps and Google Earth, Google Fusion Tables is able to plot a list of addresses using only a single address field with substantial lenience in formatting. These points can then be converted into a shapefile for use in ESRI ArcMap.
- You need to prepare your list of addresses. If the full address (street number, street, city, state/province, zip/postal code, country) is not already in the same field, you can create a new field in your table and concatenate. For example, if you have a "city" field and a "state" field, and you want one field for "city, state", you can concatenate your two fields with &", "&. You want your list of addresses to look like the way you would type an address into Google Maps (e.g. 123 Main St. Anytown, MA 01234).
- Import your table into Google Fusion Tables.
- Go to Edit > Modify Columns. Here, you can change the type of each of your columns. Your single address field should be the ONLY field marked as "Location".
- Visualize > Map in order to geocode your addresses.
- Export to KML, and open the KML file in Google Earth.
- You then need to "save your places" as another KML.
- Bring that file into GIS through the KML to Layer conversion tool in ArcGIS (Conversion Tools > From KML > KML to Layer).
Note: There is a limit per user per day of the number of geocoded addresses allowed by Google. An easy way to bypass this limit is by splitting your address list into multiple tables and merging the results.
See Also
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