ArcGIS Online analysis to remove duplicates or dissolve coincident points

Jay_Gregory · ‎07-14-2023

I have a feature layer of geocoded locations - I'd like to perform some drive time analysis on those geocoded locations, but in some cases I have over 50 records geocoded to the same exact point. I do not need to perform drive time on each of those 50 records, just one since it's a unique location. Without using ArcGIS Pro or doing any preprocessing of the data before I geocode, is there a workflow within the analysis capabilities hat can help with this? Normally I might use remove duplicates or dissolve points based on the geocoded address fields, but none of those seem to be available in the map viewer. Any ideas here?

SarahAmbrose · ‎07-18-2023

Hi @Jay_Gregory, great question. To create a layer that only has unique points, you can use a few tools in succession to create a polygon for each point, dissolve the overlapping polygons to find unique locations, and then find the centroid of each unique polygon to create the unique points. Below is a workflow to complete this:

Run Create Buffers on the geocoded points. Use a small distance, like 1 foot. For other parameters, use the tool defaults.
Run Dissolve Boundaries on the Create Buffer output. There is now a single polygon at each unique geocoded location.
Run Find Centroids on the Dissolve Boundaries output. This will create a unique point for each unique location.
[Optional]If you want to keep the attributes from your original data, you can use Join Features to add the attribute data to the new point layer. The target layer will be the Find Centroids output and the join layer will be the original data.
Perform Drive Time Analysis like you planned to.

Thank you again for the great question - we’ll be sure to look at how we can create this functionality into a single tool in the future. Please let us know if this works or you have any questions.

If you are using ArcGIS Online, try out the tools in the new Map Viewer so you can take advantage of new features like an updated UI and history.

Sarah Ambrose
Map Viewer Analysis and GeoAnalytics Product Engineer

View solution in original post

SarahAmbrose · ‎07-18-2023

Hi @Jay_Gregory, great question. To create a layer that only has unique points, you can use a few tools in succession to create a polygon for each point, dissolve the overlapping polygons to find unique locations, and then find the centroid of each unique polygon to create the unique points. Below is a workflow to complete this:

Run Create Buffers on the geocoded points. Use a small distance, like 1 foot. For other parameters, use the tool defaults.
Run Dissolve Boundaries on the Create Buffer output. There is now a single polygon at each unique geocoded location.
Run Find Centroids on the Dissolve Boundaries output. This will create a unique point for each unique location.
[Optional]If you want to keep the attributes from your original data, you can use Join Features to add the attribute data to the new point layer. The target layer will be the Find Centroids output and the join layer will be the original data.
Perform Drive Time Analysis like you planned to.

Thank you again for the great question - we’ll be sure to look at how we can create this functionality into a single tool in the future. Please let us know if this works or you have any questions.

If you are using ArcGIS Online, try out the tools in the new Map Viewer so you can take advantage of new features like an updated UI and history.

Sarah Ambrose
Map Viewer Analysis and GeoAnalytics Product Engineer

Jay_Gregory · ‎07-18-2023

Thanks @SarahAmbrose - this is what we came to as well. Looking forward to a day when it takes fewer steps, but this is a great solution in the meantime!