Discovering Tampa Bay data

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library(tampaBayOpenData)

tampaBayOpenData::tbod_list_portals()[, c("id", "publisher", "jurisdiction")]
#> # A tibble: 6 × 3
#>   id           publisher                           jurisdiction
#>   <chr>        <chr>                               <chr>       
#> 1 city         City of Tampa                       tampa       
#> 2 tbrpc        Tampa Bay Regional Planning Council tampa-bay   
#> 3 stpete       City of St. Petersburg              stpete      
#> 4 clearwater   City of Clearwater                  clearwater  
#> 5 hillsborough Hillsborough County                 hillsborough
#> 6 pinellas     Pinellas County                     pinellas
tampaBayOpenData::tbod_list_datasets(source = "checked")[,
  c("id", "title", "jurisdiction", "validation_status")]
#> # A tibble: 52 × 4
#>    id                   title                     jurisdiction validation_status
#>    <chr>                <chr>                     <chr>        <chr>            
#>  1 construction-permits Permits (active GIS view) tampa        checked          
#>  2 development-cases    Active development coord… tampa        checked          
#>  3 capital-projects     Capital improvement proj… tampa        checked          
#>  4 city-boundary        Tampa boundary (shorelin… tampa        checked          
#>  5 neighborhoods        Neighborhood association… tampa        checked          
#>  6 council-districts    City council districts    tampa        checked          
#>  7 riverwalk            Tampa Riverwalk segments  tampa        checked          
#>  8 parks                Park polygons             tampa        checked          
#>  9 fire-stations        City of Tampa fire stati… tampa        checked          
#> 10 bike-lanes           Bicycle network segments  tampa        checked          
#> # ℹ 42 more rows
tampaBayOpenData::tbod_search_datasets(
  "park", source = "checked", spatial = TRUE,
  jurisdiction = c("stpete", "clearwater")
)
#> # A tibble: 2 × 23
#>   id             title description jurisdiction publisher source_url service_url
#>   <chr>          <chr> <chr>       <chr>        <chr>     <chr>      <chr>      
#> 1 clearwater-pa… Clea… City of Cl… clearwater   City of … https://g… https://gi…
#> 2 stpete-parks   St. … Public par… stpete       City of … https://c… https://se…
#> # ℹ 16 more variables: geometry_type <chr>, category <chr>, verified <date>,
#> #   terms <chr>, layer_id <int>, date_fields <list>, tags <list>,
#> #   item_id <chr>, portal <chr>, validation_status <chr>, modified <dttm>,
#> #   modified_source <chr>, service_type <chr>, layer_type <chr>,
#> #   categories <list>, original_metadata <list>
tampaBayOpenData::tbod_dataset_info("construction-permits")[
  c("title", "scope_note", "verified")]
#> $title
#> [1] "Permits (active GIS view)"
#> 
#> $scope_note
#> [1] "The upstream service is described as data for an internal active-permits viewer, although its public Query endpoint is accessible without a token. The date fields are LASTUPDATE and CREATEDDATE; no permit issue-date field is advertised. No explicit dataset license was found on this exact FeatureServer service or in the selected public ArcGIS organization catalog. Do not infer the license of a separate MapServer layer."
#> 
#> $verified
#> [1] "2026-09-29"

source = "checked" reads the registry without HTTP. IDs such as construction-permits and stpete-parks are package names, not ArcGIS item IDs. tbod_dataset_info(id) gives the scope, terms, source URL, and endpoint verification date; that date says nothing about record freshness. The coverage article has counts by publisher, and the selection policy explains which layers enter the catalog.

Match and rank search results

tbod_search_datasets() searches checked IDs, titles, descriptions, publisher names, categories, and tags. It ignores case, but treats punctuation literally. All words in the query must occur somewhere in a checked row; they can occur in different fields. If no checked row matches literally, the search tries a limited spelling fallback for alphanumeric query words; words shorter than four characters have no typo tolerance. The fallback searches only the checked catalog; it does not alter a live portal query. An empty or whitespace-only query lists datasets.

Exact title or ID matches come first. Title or ID prefixes follow, then substrings, then rows whose title or ID contains the query words separately. Matches in tags, categories, or publisher come next; description-only matches follow those. Within each group, each word scores title, ID, tags or categories, publisher, and description in that order; title, ID, and source URL then break ties consistently. These are ordering rules, not measures of dataset quality or relevance to a specific analysis.

tbod_search_datasets("permit", source = "checked", limit = 5)[,
  c("id", "title", "publisher")]
tbod_search_datasets("permti", source = "checked", limit = 5)[,
  c("id", "title", "publisher")]
tbod_search_datasets("", source = "checked", limit = 5)[,
  c("id", "title", "publisher")]

limit is a nonnegative whole number or Inf (the default). It selects the first rows after source discovery, checked overlay, filtering, and ranking. Even limit = 0 still performs a selected live scan and retains its scan diagnostics. max_items separately caps the number of service items inspected per live portal. A result limit does not make an incomplete scan complete.

Discover live portal layers

found <- tbod_search_datasets("housing", source = "live", portals = "city")
found[, c("id", "title", "publisher", "validation_status", "modified")]

# A one-row result carries the source needed for inspection or retrieval.
if (nrow(found)) {
  selected <- found[1, ]
  selected[, c("item_id", "service_url", "layer_id", "portal")]
  tbod_dataset_info(selected)
}

By default, tbod_list_datasets() and tbod_search_datasets() use source = "all": they search all six portals and include the checked catalog. source = "live" returns only layers found through portal indexes, including checked layers when a live endpoint matches a checked entry. If a source is not indexed or an index lags, it may not appear in live results; a compatible public ArcGIS layer can still be retrieved by URL with tbod_get_arcgis_layer(). Portal indexes can match fields that are not returned in discovery rows. tbod_search_datasets() ranks indexed hits using available title, ID, and metadata, but keeps all portal hits even when a returned row has no local text match. A layer found both live and in the checked catalog appears once with checked status. With source = "all", a checked match can still appear when its portal index does not return it.

Use portals = "city" for Tampa, "tbrpc" for the regional planning council, or "stpete", "clearwater", "hillsborough", or "pinellas" for the other publishers. A vector selects several. tbod_list_portals() shows their publisher names and source locations offline. jurisdiction defaults to "all" for catalog functions and can be a code or a vector of codes. A jurisdiction or publisher filter narrows the organizations scanned and filters checked entries. portals only selects live organizations; it does not filter checked entries when source = "all". Retrieval and download functions default to jurisdiction = NULL: a checked ID resolves across the bundled catalog when it is unique. If two jurisdictions use the same ID, supply jurisdiction to select one.

When a live endpoint matches a checked entry, the result keeps its package ID, scope, and terms, combines checked and portal tags and categories, and uses the portal item’s modification time. New IDs have the form arcgis:<item-id>:<layer-id> and can be passed to tbod_get_dataset() later. The item or service can still change or disappear. Retrieval checks query responses and requires Query when the layer advertises a capabilities list.

Search beyond the bundled publishers

tbod_discover() accepts a public ArcGIS sharing REST root, FeatureServer or MapServer service root, or a layer URL. Portal queries search public service items; service queries filter layer names. Both return rows accepted by tbod_get_dataset(). Portal results have discovered status and stable arcgis: IDs; service results have not_checked status and use the layer URL as their ID. Queryable MapServer layers are supported.

# Replace this example address with your portal's public sharing REST root.
portal <- "https://example.maps.arcgis.com/sharing/rest"
other <- tbod_discover(portal, query = "parks", max_items = 10)
if (nrow(other)) {
  data <- tbod_get_dataset(other[1, ], limit = 100)
  # A stable ArcGIS ID can also be resolved later through its own portal.
  same_layer <- tbod_get_dataset(other$id[[1]], portal = portal, limit = 100)
}

Custom sources default to an "unspecified" jurisdiction. Set publisher and jurisdiction in tbod_discover() when you know them; these labels then travel with the discovery row and its retrieval provenance. The portal argument on retrieval applies only to a stable arcgis:<item-id>:<layer-id> ID. When retrieving a direct layer URL, tbod_get_dataset() does not accept a jurisdiction override.

Filter results

Both catalog functions accept these optional filters:

Character filters accept vectors: values within one filter are alternatives; separate filters and the search text must all match. Date bounds accept a Date or strict "YYYY-MM-DD" string for a whole UTC day, or a POSIXct value for an exact instant. Rows with unknown modification times are excluded only when a date bound is supplied.

county_transport <- tbod_search_datasets(
  "road", source = "live", jurisdiction = "pinellas", spatial = TRUE,
  topic = "transportation", modified_after = as.Date("2025-01-01"),
  max_items = 10
)
county_transport[, c("id", "title", "publisher", "modified", "modified_source")]

modified_source = "portal_item" identifies a live ArcGIS item timestamp; "checked_snapshot" identifies an upstream timestamp saved in the checked registry. Neither establishes when every record was last updated. The separate checked verified date records an endpoint check, not feature freshness.

Understand scan limits and failures

max_items caps portal service items per organization, not the number of expanded layers. The default scans at most 25 items per organization. Use max_items = Inf explicitly to follow all available search pages, with a suitable total_timeout. A capped listing can miss matching items beyond the scan limit. jurisdiction and publisher narrow organizations before scanning; other filters apply after discovery and the checked overlay. Consequently, an item matching topic or modified_after may be missed by a capped scan. publisher matches a configured name exactly, without regard to case; a name with no match returns no rows. Use tbod_list_portals() to inspect names.

results <- tbod_list_datasets(source = "live", portals = "stpete", max_items = 10)
attr(results, "discovery_complete")
attr(results, "discovery_truncated_portals")
attr(results, "discovery_scanned_items")
attr(results, "discovery_issues")
attr(results, "discovery_failed_portals")

Check discovery_complete before treating results as a complete scan of the selected public portal indexes. It does not establish a complete inventory of publisher services. Portal indexes can lag or omit items, private services are outside the search, and the package includes only public Feature Service and Map Service items with supported, queryable layers. The other attributes show scan progress, skipped items, and failed portals. A time budget can stop an operation; capped scans or item failures can leave returned results incomplete. A combined search retains rows from working publishers or from earlier pages of a failed scan. If all selected portals fail before returning rows, source = "live" errors; source = "all" warns and returns checked rows.

Continue with retrieval and downloads or read about coverage and source limits.