Lots of spatial packages in R look nice: <a href="http://cran.r-project.org/web/views/Spatial.html">http://cran.r-project.org/web/views/Spatial.html</a> starting w/ sp (<a href="http://rspatial.r-forge.r-project.org">http://rspatial.r-forge.r-project.org</a>). Python can learn a lot from these.

Kelsey Jordahl

@kajord