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Intersection Modes

Vector endpoints use one of two intersection modes, automatically determined by your AOI geometry.

Modes

intersect (area-weighted)

Used for polygons and points with radius > 0.

Features are clipped to the AOI, and statistics are weighted based on the weighting_method parameter.

touch (unweighted)

Used for bare points (no radius, or radius = 0).

All features that spatially touch the point are included with equal weight. No area-based weighting is applied.

Auto-Detection

AOI Mode Weighting
Point, no radius touch Unweighted
Point, radius = 0 touch Unweighted
Point, radius > 0 intersect Area-weighted
Polygon intersect Area-weighted

Weighting Methods

When using intersect mode, you can choose how features are weighted using the weighting_method parameter:

area (default)

Standard areal interpolation. Features are weighted by their intersection area:

weight = intersection_area

Larger clipped areas contribute more to the result. This is the standard approach used in GIS for area-weighted statistics.

Use when:

  • Values represent densities, rates, or intensive properties (e.g., temperature, species density per km²)
  • You want larger areas within your AOI to have more influence
  • Working with habitat zones, environmental regions, or coverage data

Example:

Feature Value Intersection Area Weight
A 87 283,722,930 m² 283,722,930
B 323 551,934,911 m² 551,934,911 
mean = (87 × 283,722,930 + 323 × 551,934,911) / (283,722,930 + 551,934,911)
     = 242.88

ratio

Features are weighted by the proportion of the feature that falls inside the AOI:

weight = intersection_area / feature_area

Each feature has a base weight of 1.0, scaled by how much of it is captured.

Use when:

  • Features represent discrete entities (e.g., individual parcels, buildings)
  • You want each feature to contribute proportionally to its coverage
  • A feature that's 50% inside the AOI should contribute half as much as one fully inside

Example:

Feature Value Feature Area Intersection Area Weight
A 87 1,497,409,128 m² 283,722,930 m² 0.189
B 323 1,664,686,543 m² 551,934,911 m² 0.332 
mean = (87 × 0.189 + 323 × 0.332) / (0.189 + 0.332)
     = 237.20

Request Example

{
  "aoi": {
    "type": "Polygon",
    "coordinates": [[[-0.16, 51.5], [-0.11, 51.5], [-0.11, 51.52], [-0.16, 51.52], [-0.16, 51.5]]]
  },
  "url": "https://example.com/data.parquet",
  "columns": ["population_density"],
  "weighting_method": "area"
}

Note

The weighting_method parameter only applies to vector endpoints in intersect mode. It has no effect on touch mode or raster endpoints.