Crop for SpatialPolygonsDataFrame

Question

I have two SpatialPolygonsDataFrame files: dat1, dat2

extent(dat1)
class       : Extent 
xmin        : -180 
xmax        : 180 
ymin        : -9         


        

Answer 1

Here is an example of how to do this with rgeos using the world map as an example

This comes from Roger Bivand on R-sig-Geo mailing list. Roger is one of the authors of the sp package.

Using the world map as an example

library(maptools)

data(wrld_simpl)

# interested in the arealy bounded by the following rectangle
# rect(130, 40, 180, 70)

library(rgeos)
# create  a polygon that defines the boundary
bnds <- cbind(x=c(130, 130, 180, 180, 130), y=c(40, 70, 70, 40, 40))
# convert to a spatial polygons object with the same CRS
SP <- SpatialPolygons(list(Polygons(list(Polygon(bnds)), "1")),
proj4string=CRS(proj4string(wrld_simpl)))
# find the intersection with the original SPDF
gI <- gIntersects(wrld_simpl, SP, byid=TRUE)
# create the new spatial polygons object.
out <- vector(mode="list", length=length(which(gI)))
ii <- 1
for (i in seq(along=gI)) if (gI[i]) {
  out[[ii]] <- gIntersection(wrld_simpl[i,], SP)
  row.names(out[[ii]]) <- row.names(wrld_simpl)[i]; ii <- ii+1
}
# use rbind.SpatialPolygons method to combine into a new object.
out1 <- do.call("rbind", out)
# look here is Eastern Russia and a bit of Japan and China.
plot(out1, col = "khaki", bg = "azure2")