How can I make my own geography appear in a hierarchy?

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You may want to create a plan that uses your own geography for some or all of the layers in the hierarchy. In this example, we will create a hierarchy of blocks, an updated precinct layer and counties.

To create a custom hierarchy:
  1. Click and choose Map, Workspace (*.map, .wrk)  as the file type.
  2. Open a map that contains the blocks and counties.
  3. Click and click Add layer.
  4. Choose the updated precinct layer and click Open to add it to the map.
  5. Click Close to close map layers.
  6. Verify that the base layer of the plan contains the unique fields for the other layers in your hierarchy. To do this, right-click on the base layer for the plan and choose new dataview.
  7. Each layer requires a field that contains the relationship to all higher levels in the hierarchy. For this example the precinct and county fields are part of the hierarchy and must be included in the block layer.
  8. Right-click on the precinct layer and choose New Dataview. Confirm that there is a field with the county relationship.
  9. Right-click on the county layer and choose New Dataview to confirm the presence of the required field for county.
  10. Open Windows Notepad or another text editor to create the necessary hierarchy file.
  11. Specify the file name and field name for each layer in hierarchical order, starting with the block file name on the first line (without the file extension, .cdf) and the block identifier, Block, on the next line.
  12. The precinct file name and precinct field, and the county file name and county field should each follow on their own lines. Be sure to click enter at the end of each line.
  13. Save the file to the Caliper folder in the My Documents folder. The file must be a text file named HIERARCHIES.txt.
Create a Redistricting Plan Using the Updated Geography and Custom Hierarchy:
  1. Choose Redistricting>Plan Manager and click New…
  2. Choose Interactively from areas in a map and click Next.
  3. Enter the plan settings and verify that your custom hierarchy is selected in the Layer Hierarchy drop-down; click Next.
  4. Add summary fields as desired and click Next.
  5. Add plan properties as desired and click Finish.
  6. Enter a plan filename and click Save.
Maptitude for Redistricting creates the plan and is ready for redistricting.
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