UK postcode distance calculation?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Steve Hawkins
  • Start date Start date
S

Steve Hawkins

Hi all, (new here so be gentle!),

Can somebody tell me if there is a facility within Excel for calculating the
distances between UK post codes. If not, is there an add on which will
provide this facility (preferably freeware), or, failing that, is there a
way to incorporate the calculating boxes from websites which provide this
service into Excel?

I'm a bit vague on the higher levels of what excel can do, but I'm sure
somebody out there must be using it to do such calculations without having
to go on line and work them all out individually, so how is it done?

Much obliged for any useful suggestions,

Regards,

Steve_H
 
Steve Hawkins said:
Hi all, (new here so be gentle!),

Can somebody tell me if there is a facility within Excel for calculating the
distances between UK post codes. If not, is there an add on which will
provide this facility (preferably freeware), or, failing that, is there a
way to incorporate the calculating boxes from websites which provide this
service into Excel?
Click to expand...

I don't think it is possible to do this, but should you for example obtain
the latitude and longtitude of the two locations designated by the postcodes
it is possible to do it that way.

I have already (with some help) created a spreadsheet that will give the
distance between two sets of lat/long coordinates.

Marcus
 
Steve,

I would suggest you get something like MS Autoroute. You may be able to get
the 2001 version quite cheap but it wont know changes made since but this
may not be significant. Set up a route between any PostCodes and calculate
the distance (by road). Of course other route planners have the same
facility. This may not be the answer but it is a workable solution.

Regards.

Bill Ridgeway
Computer Solutions
 
Hi Marcus - that was quick!

Sites such as Multimap and GoogleEarth are very helpful in finding routes
and distances between points, for various transport modes. Multimap seems
to manage whether postcode, conventional address, UK Grid reference or long
and lat are entered - this would be the normal way for me to convert a post
code into a long and lat.

As these facilities seem to be getting more and more common I had hoped that
whatever they used to enable such calculations would now be available to
all - preferably with distances expressible as 'crow flies', 'road' etc.
I'm pretty impressed that you have managed to create your own facility for
calculating distances based on lat and long, but as I would still have to
look these up individually, I'm afraid I would not be any better off.

Thanks very much for the kind response, however.

Regards,
Steve_H

(incidentally I would also love to have a camera with gps built in, so that
I didn't have to spend hours poring over maps trying to remember where I
took the pics!)
 
Would I be able to link this function into a spread sheet from MS Autoroute
or would I still have to be looking up distances one at a time in MS
Autoroute and copying them across? Otherwise, sounds like at least a
partial solution if I am without web access for any reason.

Thanks for the speedy response,

Regards,

Steve_H
 
Steve Hawkins said:
Hi Marcus - that was quick!

Sites such as Multimap and GoogleEarth are very helpful in finding routes
and distances between points, for various transport modes. Multimap seems
to manage whether postcode, conventional address, UK Grid reference or long
and lat are entered - this would be the normal way for me to convert a post
code into a long and lat.
Click to expand...

The only other way is that you will need to have access to a database that
contains the postcode location information.

Marcus
 
Steve, You would have to look them up one at a time and enter the distance
into MS Autoroute.

Regards.

Bill Ridgeway
Computer Solutions
 
Thanks to Bill and Marcus,

I would have appeared to have identified a handy little add on somebody
might like to design. Though I have to admit that I am somewhat surprised
to find no-one has done this already.

Regards,

Steve_H

(In case you are wondering, one use I had been thinking of for this was to
enable simple calculation of a possible tax multiplier aimed at reducing
traffic congestion caused by travel to work. It would have been useful to
be able to simply enter the postcode of an employee or prospective employee
into a spreadsheet, calculate the distance from the employment location
postcode; sum all the distances, and divide by the number of employees. The
bigger the resulting factor (I like to call it the 'chaos' factor) the more
traffic is likely to be generated by that businesses flectional decision,
and the more it should be taxed. Over time, suitable weighting given to
this tax multiplier should encourage businesses to locate in places where
there is a suitable workforce, rather than plonking down in the middle of
nowhere and expecting employees to find their own way there. It could thus
provide a relatively painless way of addressing a number of development and
planning issues.)
 
I think the Post Office maintains a Postcode-Address file which lists
every UK postcode and its associated address (not sure if it has
lattitude and longitude information). I've seen copies of this (maybe
not totally up to date) on cover discs on various PC magazines in the
past. I'm sure you have to pay for the latest version, but you might be
able to get a starting point by checking out the cover discs from back
issues.

Hope this helps.

Pete
 
Back
Top