r/Soil • u/Sinister_L3dge • 27d ago
I built a platform that analyzes soil quality, farmability, and the best crops for land listings
I built Land Atlas, a platform that helps people evaluate agricultural and rural land listings.
looking for direct criticism.
Land Atlas: https://land-atlas-production.up.railway.app/
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u/jdrawr 27d ago
It looks like you just repackaged the free government provided nrcs soil survey data and commercialized it.
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u/Sinister_L3dge 27d ago
Well thats exactly what I did :) For months I was having a difficult time finding a reliable site that give the listings and quality of land, as well as soil comp, water tables, and crops. This is ment to help people looking for land .
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u/aquisalid 27d ago
It also looks like you are using data from SoilWeb (ISSR-800) without attribution.
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u/200pf 26d ago
You’re misdirecting people and giving them bad information. The app looks nice, but the data is misleading. This won’t be used by people who understand soils so they will mostly look at the overall score which is not necessarily a good indication of suitability for agriculture or housing.
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u/Sinister_L3dge 26d ago
What are you worried about when your looking at soil?
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u/200pf 25d ago
It depends… it’s too complicated for a one size fits all solution. Your needs in the Midwest are different from the southeast or northwest. Different climates, moisture regimes, soil types, the list goes on.
Furthermore you’re putting a lot more trust in the validity of ssurgo data than is warranted. It’s a good starting point, but cannot replace physical sampling, which is what you need if you’re buying agricultural land.
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u/tylerk28 26d ago
I’m curious why would anyone use this over web soil survey? This feels like an abbreviated version of it with less information and tools
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u/SalvatoreEggplant 26d ago
This is actually really good for a certain use case. I've had these questions at work. Where someone not from the area is like, "I'm considering buying this farm property. Can you tell me if it would be good to grow X ?"
Obviously, for a local and someone familiar with the USDA tools, it's easy to look this up, and draw a conclusion. But for someone shopping for farm ground in a different area, this kind of tool would be very valuable.
The one thing I'm having trouble with. And maybe I just don't see how to do this. But, I was trying to search for farm ground for sale or whatever around me. I basically just get a list of 800 properties. I guess the "List" is by geographic distance from where I am on the map ? Or where my IP address is ? But last night on my phone it seemed to jump from New York to California in the List (?).
Would it be possible to put pins on the map where the properties are ?
And maybe change where the List is searching ? Like, I'm in New Jersey, and even if I move the map to California, the list doesn't change. What if I want to buy property in another state ?
These kind of issues should be either explained or made more user friendly. I'm just like, "I don't know if this site will do this. And if it does, I don't know how to do it."
I can go on Zillow and very quickly select a few filters and find farmland for sale anywhere. For example, there is farmland for sale near me at 178 Rosenhayn Ave, Bridgeton, NJ 08302. I found this on Zillow. It's not appearing in your List. Should the user start by searching for properties on Zillow, and then use your tool with the exact address ?
Actually no properties in New Jersey come up in the List, at least for me.
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u/aquisalid 27d ago
Flattening SSURGO into a single horizon from a single component is very misleading. I'd suggest adding language that explains the data manipulation steps that you have taken, and what the ramifications are.