ne_download: Download data from Natural Earth and (optionally) read into R

In AndySouth/rnaturalearth: World Map Data from Natural Earth

Download data from Natural Earth and (optionally) read into R

Description

returns downloaded data as a spatial object or the filename if load=FALSE. if destdir is specified the data can be reloaded in a later R session using ne_load with the same arguments.

Usage

ne_download(
  scale = 110L,
  type = "countries",
  category = c("cultural", "physical", "raster"),
  destdir = tempdir(),
  load = TRUE,
  returnclass = c("sf", "sv")
)

Arguments

scale	The scale of map to return, one of '110', '50', '10' or 'small', 'medium', 'large'.
type	type of natural earth file to download one of 'countries', 'map_units', 'map_subunits', 'sovereignty', 'states' OR the portion of any natural earth vector url after the scale and before the . e.g. for 'ne_50m_urban_areas.zip' this would be 'urban_areas'. See Details. OR the raster filename e.g. for 'MSR_50M.zip' this would be 'MSR_50M'
category	one of natural earth categories : 'cultural', 'physical', 'raster'
destdir	where to save files, defaults to tempdir(), getwd() is also possible.
load	'TRUE' to load the spatial object into R, 'FALSE' to return the filename of the downloaded object. If the requested object is a vector, it will be saved as a GPKG file. If a raster is requested, it will be saved as a GeoTIFF file.
returnclass	A string determining the spatial object to return. Either "sf" for for simple feature (from 'sf', the default) or "sv" for a 'SpatVector' (from 'terra').

Details

Note that the filename of the requested object will be returned if 'load = FALSE'.

If the data is to be loaded into memory ('load = TRUE'), the download will be handled using the GDAL virtual file system, allowing direct access to the data without writing it to disk.

Value

An object of class 'sf' for simple feature (from 'sf', the default) or 'SpatVector' (from 'terra').

See Also

ne_load, pre-downloaded data are available using ne_countries, ne_states. Other geographic data are available in the raster package : getData.

Examples

## Not run: 
spdf_world <- ne_download(scale = 110, type = "countries")

plot(spdf_world)
plot(ne_download(type = "populated_places"))

# reloading from the saved file in the same session with same arguments

spdf_world2 <- ne_load(scale = 110, type = "countries")

# download followed by load from specified directory will work across sessions
spdf_world <- ne_download(scale = 110, type = "countries", destdir = getwd())
spdf_world2 <- ne_load(scale = 110, type = "countries", destdir = getwd())

# for raster, here an example with Manual Shaded Relief (MSR) download & load

rst <- ne_download(scale = 50, type = "MSR_50M", category = "raster", destdir = getwd())

# load after having downloaded
rst <- ne_load(
  scale = 50, type = "MSR_50M", category = "raster", destdir = getwd()
)

# plot
library(terra)
terra::plot(rst)
# end dontrun

## End(Not run)

AndySouth/rnaturalearth documentation built on April 14, 2025, 3:22 a.m.