Tuesday, March 30, 2021

Find a Optimal location for a Indian Restaurant in Colombo, Sri Lanka


Introduction

Background

The success of establishing a new restaurant depends on several factors: demand, brand loyalty, quality of food, competition, ambiance,etc... In most cases, a restaurant’s location plays an essential determinant for its success. Hence, it is advantageous and of utmost importance to determine the most strategic location for establishment in order to maximize business profits.

Business Problem

A client seeks to establish a franchised Indian restaurant,in a Colombo District,Sri Lanka. Which neighbourhood would appear to be the optimal and most strategic location for the business operations? The objective of this capstone project is to locate the optimal neighborhood for operation.since there are lots of restaurants in Colombo , we will try to detect location that are not already crowded with restaurants.we are also particularly interested areas with no Indian restaurants in vicinity, but this could be a place very near to other venues such as parks, Movie Theaters  etc..

Interests

Fellow entrepreneurs seeking to either establish a new restaurant of a certain niche or have plans to expand their franchised restaurants would be very interested in the competitive advantages and business values this finding can potentially reap.

Data 

Creating list of Neighbourhoods in Colombo

Colombo is capital of sri lanka with 676km^2 land area with a population over 2.5 million.Colombo district divided into 557 Grama Niladhari (GN) Divisions , which would be the smallest division for the neighbourhood). The survey department of srilanka contains map of GN divisions of sri lanka and from this site we can download KMZ file of Colombo district. with a help of online converter ,data can be converted to a geojson file.





Following figure shows all Neighbourhoods (Grama Niladhari Divisions) in Colombo district.


Restaurant / Food venues in Colombo respect to each neighborhood


Data is pulled for each neighborhood using foursquare venue API. later screened these data as described in analysis section. 




Analysis 

Exploratory Data Analysis

This image shows a heat map based on all the restaurants in Colombo district.

The blue dots signifies indian restaurants .


Based on the above results lets limit our area or search to boundaries created by potential neighbourhoods. Please see Red Rectangle in the following image.



Then fine grid coordinates were created (100m apart) and derived number of restaurants within 250m and distance to the nearest Indian restaurant for each grid point. 3740 grid points were created. 


Then later on these points filtered by location where points having more than 5 restaurants in a radius of 250 meters, but no Indian restaurants in a radius of 500 meters.Following image shows these point in blue markers.


K-Means Clustering¶


Above points data is clustered using the K-Means algorithm to identify potential zones. “Within cluster sum of squared errors” is calculated for each cluster to determine the best k value.

12 zones were identified and following are the address list for each zone.



lat

long

Address

0

6.869550

79.980703

Healhline, 15 Pietersz Pl, Nugegoda 10250, Sri Lanka

1

6.932300

79.980703

12 Gunathilaka Rd, Sri Lanka

2

6.897884

79.980703

137 Battaramulla - Pannipitiya Rd, Battaramulla 10120, Sri Lanka

3

6.922491

79.980703

00200, 199 Vauxhall St, Colombo 01000, Sri Lanka

4

6.910550

79.980703

411/B Athurugiriya Rd, Malabe, Sri Lanka

5

6.858122

79.980703

25 Sri Mahabodhi Rd, Dehiwala-Mount Lavinia, Sri Lanka

6

6.852439

79.980703

31 Pasal Mawatha, Dehiwala-Mount Lavinia, Sri Lanka

7

6.910350

79.980703

200 Welikada-Nawala Rd, Sri Jayawardenepura Kotte, Sri Lanka

8

6.879187

79.980703

343 Kotte Rd, Nugegoda 10100, Sri Lanka

9

6.839550

79.980703

Bus Stop, Pannipitiya, Sri Lanka

10

6.838884

79.980703

17 Hotel Rd, Dehiwala-Mount Lavinia 10370, Sri Lanka

11

6.899050

79.980703

506 Colombo - Galle - Hambantota - Wellawaya Hwy, Colombo, Sri Lanka

Results and Discussion 

Colombo district there are around 1300 food places, as per foursquare data. As we shown in earlier maps most of restaurants are aligned in beach areas from Colombo Fort to Moratuwa. And there are some key places like Kollupitiya, Bambalapitiya ,Wellawatta and ibbanwala most of these areas within the commercial area of Colombo. interestingly we can see some more restaurant areas in Rajagiriya , pittugala , plwatta and kohuwala area.

After our initial exploratory analysis we decided ROI area of 10km x 15Km where we noticed food places are majorly located.Then we create dense grid location candidate spaced around 100m and generate data for each point such that number of restaurant nearby (250m) and distance to the nearest Indian Restaurant.There are 3740 place as such. Later on we filter having at least 6 restaurant within 250m and distance to next indian restaurant more than 500m. These location candidates were then clustered to create zones of interest which contain the greatest number of location candidates. Address of centres of those zones were also generated using google reverse geocoding API.

we identified 12 zones containing largest number of potential new restaurant location based on number of other restaurant in vicinity and enough far away from other Indian Restaurants.Other factors should be considered such as rent price of the area and availability good sizable building with parking.

Conclusion 

Purpose of this project was to identify Colombo areas which are popular foodie locations in order to aid stakeholders in narrowing down the search for the optimal location for a new Indian restaurant. By calculating restaurant density distribution from Foursquare data we have first identified general distribution of restaurants and then generated an extensive collection of locations which satisfy some basic requirements regarding existing nearby restaurants. Clustering of those locations was then performed in order to create major zones of interest (containing greatest number of potential locations) and addresses of those zone centers were created to be used as starting points for final exploration by stakeholders. Final decision on optimal restaurant location will be made by stakeholders based on specific characteristics of neighborhoods and locations in every recommended zone, taking into consideration additional factors like attractiveness of each location (proximity to park or water), levels of noise / proximity to major roads, real estate availability, prices, social and economic dynamics of every neighborhood etc.


Sunday, October 16, 2016

PWM Solar V1.1 Update

After about 2 months of continuous operation IRF9504 failed. I guess that is due to heat up. The cause of heat up , as i assume is slow switching off time due to i have used 22k resistor to switch off the mosfet. Further arduino board got burned out ( as it seems entire flash is erased due to electrical shock) while testing. Time to design a PCB with proper safety features. (Fuses , MOVs) and improve the mosfet switching using dedicated mosfet driver. while I am designing dedicated featured circuitry. I purchased a 10A solar controller from aliexpress.
This has impressive circuitry as discussed in following video post. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BbIqNGHe6Xc

Wednesday, August 17, 2016

PWM solar Version 1.1

With the New 80W solar panel in hand , Decided to build proper circuitry with LCD display. Following are the major parts used mainly purchased via ebay.

  •  IRF9540 P-Channel Power MOSFET
  • 6x8cm Double-side Prototype PCB Universal Printed Circuit Board
  • 16X2 Character LCD Module Display Blue IIC/I2C/TWI/SP​​I Serial Interface
  • Arduino pro mini - 5V system
  • IRF520 ( For swithon bulbs automatically at night)

In this setup I am using three 7AH 12V batteries connected in parallel.

Here the solar panel placed on  the roof.




 2 12V 7Ah lead acid batteries shown here.


The circuitry. consist with arduino , PMOSFET , 6A Diode, ACS712 current sensor module and IRF520 to switch on the bulbs (small 7W LED)


 Following is the out put of the display.Top left it display the solar panel voltage. Top right it shows the battery voltage. Currnelty battery charge to it optimal level 13.5V. and it is in the floating charge state. Lower left shows the current posistive shows that it draws some current from the battery.




Sunday, May 8, 2016

Web Connected - PWM Solar Charger

I have already build a PWM solar controller, mainly with P-MOSFET  and arduino-nano. And N-MOSFET to switch on some lights when night falls.

Following a few snaps of it. It uses 10W /12V solar panel with 7Ah 12V Lead Acid battery.


Following is a realtime battery voltage using ESP8266 and  thingspeak platform.

Got a New 80W solar panel for Rs.9000. Plan is to build PWM Solar charger with Web interface so i can see the statistics of the Solar Charger System, Battery Condition via Internet and within Wi-Fi.



Following the Plan for new PWM solar charger (Web Enabled).
















A Sample sketch for the webpage. Running on ESP8266 in Access Point Mode.




Tuesday, October 27, 2015

Honda fit GP5 Service / Maintanence Manual

Following is the some pages from maintenance pages that is useful. I am currently in the process of translating the Japanese to English. the "maintenance note" booklet is received s with the 2015 Honda GP5.

Click on the image for see the zoomed image.


Severe Condition (Based on running conditions maintenance duration differs)

A- bad road (bumpy road, gravel road, unpaved road) is often running at. Indication of bad road.
  • Driver feel the impact of the bad road (feeling the push up)
  • Dusty road
  • Often travel in snow covered road

B - High mileage ( more than 20000km per year)

C - Mountain road , often traveling in the uphill slope . often have to  go down hill and have to use brake heavily

D - often Repeated running of short distances (lower than 8km per time)
      often running at sub-zero temperature

E -  Running low speed more often ( less than 30km/h) 
       if  more idling happens





*Following table not completed yet.
Maintenance item
Inspection and maintenance time

At the time of new
Inspection
Personal Use

1 month
6 month
Daily Check
Every 6
Months
Every 12
Months
Every 24
Months

Steering
Handle of the operation condition







Loosening of the attachment of the steering gear box








Steering rod, loosening of the arm such, backlash, damage







Rod, the crack of the dust boots of the ball joint of the arm such damage







Wheel Alignment







Loose mounting of power steering







Brake
Gap between floorboard and the pedal at the time of in-depth brake







White depression of the break pedal







Crisis condition of the break







Brake horse,pipe leakage , damage mounted state





































Periodic Replacement Items

Item
Time of Replacement
Comments
Engine Oil
15,000 Km  or Per year
[7500km or once per Year]

[] A,C,D,E conditions
Engine Oil Filter
30,000km or every 2 Years
[15,000km or once  per Year]

[] A,C,D,E conditions
Automatic Transmission Oil
e-CVT
150,000km or per every 6 Years
[75,000km or every 3 years]

[] A,B,C,E conditions
DCT
Per 160,000km
[per 80,000km]

[] A,C,D    Conditions
Differential oil
Realtime AWD
Every 40,000km

4WD Vehicles
(Viscous type def)
[Every 60,000km]
[] A,C Conditions
Spark Plug
Every  100,000km

Air Cleaner Element (Air filter)
Every  50,000Km
[Every  25,000Km]

[] A,C,E Conditions
Brake Fluid
First after 3 Years, next after every 2 Years

Cooling Water
First time or every 200,000km or 11 Years
Then every 120,000km or 6 Years