Roadmap: accessible weather-data features — more alert sources + new 'browser for X' datasets

[kellylford]

Overview

The Weather Browser proved a pattern: take public weather data that's normally locked in maps/radar/charts, and present it as a screen-reader-navigable list — severity-sorted, filterable, plain-language. This issue is the roadmap for extending that pattern, in two tracks:

• Track A — more alert sources for the existing browser.
• Track B — new "browser for X" features over other public weather/environmental datasets.

The value proposition is deliberate: even where this duplicates data that already exists on the web, we add value by making it accessible. Almost all of it is published only as color-shaded maps, radar/satellite images, or time-series charts — invisible to a VoiceOver user — while the underlying data is available as structured JSON/XML/CSV. Our edge is the navigation model, not the data.

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Track A — More alert sources (extend the Weather Browser)

The current browser covers US (NWS), Canada (ECCC), and Europe (MeteoAlarm, 36 countries). Candidates to add:

• Australia — Bureau of Meteorology (BOM): has CAP warnings, but distributed via registered FTP / anonymous feeds rather than a clean JSON API. Messier, separate integration.
• Japan — JMA: publishes JSON warnings, but per-municipality and structured very differently; needs its own normalizer.
• New Zealand — MetService: CAP feed exists; smaller but relatively clean.
• MeteoAlarm gaps: North Macedonia's feed slug 404'd during the initial build; revisit if/when it's available. Greece's generic "Yellow Warning" (~28 alerts) currently lands in "Other" — could be resolved by classifying from the structured awareness_type parameter.

None are as turnkey as the current three. Priority: lower than Track B's top items, but BOM/JMA close obvious geographic gaps.

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Track B — New accessible weather-data features

All endpoints verified live (July 2026). Everything in the NOAA / NWS / USGS / EPA-Envirofacts ecosystem is free and keyless unless noted.

Prioritized shortlist — build these first

Ranked by (accessibility gap × usefulness × ease/keyless) and fit with the existing browser navigation model.

#	Feature	Source (keyless unless noted)	Why it's top-tier
1	Active Tropical Systems (Hurricanes)	NHC nhc.noaa.gov/CurrentStorms.json + forecast advisories	Highest stakes. The cone / spaghetti-track map is the archetypal inaccessible weather graphic. Direct extension of the alerts browser's life-safety mission.
2	Severe Weather Outlook (SPC)	SPC RSS spc.noaa.gov/products/spcrss.xml + outlook text/GIS	Categorical risk ("Enhanced — level 3 of 5") for your location is essentially unavailable to blind users today. Huge gap, broad US relevance. Needs point-in-polygon.
3	River Levels / Flood	NWPS api.water.noaa.gov/nwps/v1/ + USGS waterservices.usgs.gov/nwis/iv/	Life-safety. Flood categories already computed in the API; plain-language mapping is trivial ("2.1 ft below flood stage — No flooding"). Pairs with flood alerts we already show.
4	Recent Earthquakes Near Me	USGS FDSN earthquake.usgs.gov/fdsnws/event/1/query + GeoJSON feeds	Easiest high-impact build — clean keyless feeds, simple list/filter, high public interest. Great early win to validate "browser for X" beyond weather.
5	Air Quality (AirNow)	AirNow airnowapi.org — free key required	Health-critical (wildfire smoke). Only reason it's not higher: needs a key AND has zip/lat-lon endpoints reportedly retiring fall 2026 — verify successors before building.
6	Marine: Buoys + Tides	NDBC ndbc.noaa.gov/data/realtime2/{station}.txt + CO-OPS api.tidesandcurrents.noaa.gov/api/prod/datagetter	Two keyless sources → one "Marine" section. Buoy maps and tide curves are strongly inaccessible; devoted user base.
7	Drought (US Drought Monitor)	usdmdataservices.unl.edu/api/... (JSON)	Iconic weekly map; cheap to cache; dead-simple to present as a category word ("D2 — Severe Drought"). Very high gap-to-effort ratio.
8	Space Weather / Aurora (SWPC)	services.swpc.noaa.gov/products/... (JSON)	Showcase feature — delightful, keyless, low-risk, genuinely inaccessible domain (aurora ovals, Kp bars). Strong "wow" demo of the mission.

Fast-follow bundles (add to per-location detail, not standalone browsers)

All keyless, all small:

• Aviation METAR/TAF decoder — aviationweather.gov/api/data/metar?ids=...&format=json. Turn cryptic METAR code into plain English ("Wind S 12 gusting 20 mph, visibility 10 mi, few clouds 25,000 ft, 84°F"). The decode itself is the accessibility win.
• Sun & Moon — sunrisesunset.io (now keyless, includes moon phase/illumination, golden hour, day length).
• UV Index — EPA Envirofacts data.epa.gov/dmapservice/getEnvirofactsUVHOURLY/ZIP/{zip}/JSON.
• Forecaster's Discussion (AFD/HWO) — already reachable via api.weather.gov/products/... (types AFD, HWO); present cleanly, optionally LLM-simplified. We already have the NWS client.

Lower priority / gated

• Active Wildfires Near Me — NIFC ArcGIS feature services (incident points keyless); perimeter geometry is heavy. Red Flag Warnings are already covered by the existing alerts browser.
• SNOTEL snowpack — USDA NRCS AWDB REST (wcc.sc.egov.usda.gov/awdbRestApi); western-US only, niche.
• Climate / almanac (records, normals) — weakest API story (NOWData is an interactive web tool, not clean JSON); confirm a stable source before committing.

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Cross-cutting implementation notes

• Reusable scaffold: nearly every feature is "geolocate or pick a location → query one keyless endpoint → sort a list by distance/severity → per-item plain-language digest → severity/type filters." That's the alerts browser generalized. Build a shared "data browser" scaffold once and reuse.
• Plain-language mapping is the accessibility value-add, not just the raw number. Codify category→prose tables (flood categories, AQI, Kp/G-scale, SPC risk levels, UV) the same way alerts got scannable digests.
• Point-in-polygon is the recurring hard part (SPC outlooks, drought areas, fire perimeters). Several sources offer point-query or nearest-station endpoints that sidestep it (NWPS gauges, NDBC, CO-OPS, SNOTEL, earthquakes-by-radius) — prefer those first.
• Keyless-first ordering respects the cost posture: these NOAA/USGS/EPA sources add zero marginal cost (unlike the paid Open-Meteo forecast tier). Only AirNow needs a free key.
• Two caveats to verify before building: (a) AirNow zip/lat-lon observation endpoints reportedly retiring fall 2026 — confirm successors; (b) the NWPS API is explicitly "not 24/7 supported, may change without notice" — build defensively with caching/fallbacks.

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Suggested first step

Build Recent Earthquakes Near Me (#4) or Drought (#7) first — both are keyless, low-complexity, and would let us extract the shared "data browser" scaffold cleanly, before tackling the higher-stakes point-in-polygon features (Hurricanes, SPC, Rivers).

Research compiled July 2026; endpoints verified live except AirNow (⚠️ pending endpoint changes).