Mapping the shortest flight path across the date line using gcIntermediate

Question

I'm creating a map of Australian airports and their international destinations using R-Leaflet.

Here is my sample data:

df<-data.frame("Australian_Airport" = "Brisbane", 
           "International" =  c("Auckland", "Bandar Seri Begawan","Bangkok","Christchurch","Denpasar","Dunedin","Hamilton","Hong Kong","Honiara","Kuala Lumpur"),
           "Australian_lon" = c(153.117, 153.117,153.117,153.117,153.117,153.117, 153.117, 153.117, 153.117, 153.117),
           "Australian_lat" = c(-27.3842,-27.3842,-27.3842,-27.3842,-27.3842,-27.3842, -27.3842, -27.3842, -27.3842, -27.3842),
           "International_lon" = c(174.7633, 114.9398, 100.5018, 172.6362, 115.2126,-82.77177, -84.56134, 114.10950, 159.97290, 101.68685),
           "International_lat" = c(-36.848460, 4.903052, 13.756331, -43.532054,-8.670458,28.019740, 39.399501, 22.396428, -9.445638,  3.139003)
           )

I thought it would be cool to use curved flight paths using gcIntermediate, so I created a SpatialLines object:

library(rgeos)
library(geosphere)

p1<-as.matrix(df[,c(3,4)])

p2<-as.matrix(df[,c(5,6)])

df2 <-gcIntermediate(p1, p2, breakAtDateLine=F, 
                    n=100, 
                    addStartEnd=TRUE,
                    sp=T) 

And then I plotted it using leaflet and Shiny:

server <-function(input, output) {

airportmap<- leaflet() %>% addTiles() %>% 
    addCircleMarkers(df, lng = df$Australian_lon, lat = df$Australian_lat, 
    radius = 2, label = paste(df$Australian_Airport, "Airport"))%>% 
    addPolylines(data = df2, weight = 1)

output$mymap <- renderLeaflet({airportmap}) # render the base map
  }


ui<-  navbarPage("International flight path statistics - top routes",
      tabPanel("Interactive map",
                  
      leafletOutput('mymap',  width="100%", height=900)
                  
         )
         )

# Run the application 
shinyApp(ui = ui, server = server)

It looks like this:

So the paths are incorrect if they cross the date line. Changing breakAtDateLine to FALSE doesn't fix it (the line disappears but the path is still broken). At this stage, I suspect I may need to use a different mapping system or something but I'd be very grateful if anyone has some advice.

Answer 1

If you are interested in another mapping library, then googleway uses Google Maps, which in my experience is better at handling lines that cross the date line.

Notes

1. To use Google Maps you need an API key
2. Currently only sf objects are supported, not sp
3. This will also work in shiny; I'm just showing you the basic map here
4. I authored googleway

---

library(sf)
library(googleway)

## convert the sp object to sf
sf <- sf::st_as_sf(df2)

set_key("your_api_key")

google_map() %>%
    add_polylines(data = sf)