From your first question to a research-grade query

Basics

Ask like you'd ask a person

Open the map and look for the assistant panel — type a question the way you'd ask a colleague who happens to know every tax lot in the city. No syntax, no address format to get right, no account.

• “Is 50 West 34th Street in a flood zone?”
• “Show me vacant lots in the Bronx”
• “What can I build at 180 East 132nd Street in the Bronx?”

“This corner” and “this lot” work too — but only once you've clicked a lot on the map first, so the assistant knows which one you mean.

Going further

Ask sharper questions once you know the words

The same assistant handles comparisons and filters across many lots at once — this is where zoning districts, FAR, and flood depth start doing real work.

• “Compare the FAR of 50 West 34th Street and 144 West 34th Street”
• “Which R6 lots near the Gowanus Canal have a flood depth over 12 inches?”
• “List commercial lots in Queens under 5,000 square feet”

On the map itself, the legend (top left) switches what you're coloring by — land use, FAR, flood risk — and 3D mode turns flood depth into an actual extrusion on the buildings it touches, rather than a number in a table.

Methodology

How the flood risk prediction is built

The flood depth layer is a model, not a sensor reading. Water runs downhill toward the nearest drain, and HAND (Height Above Nearest Drainage) measures how far above that drainage point each spot on the ground sits. For each of NYC's 241 FloodNet sensors, the model works out how high the water actually got in a real storm, then checks every nearby building against its own HAND value — sit lower than that water level and the model marks you flooded.

Depth numbers run high by design, so treat them as a ceiling, not a measurement. The confidence score on each lot reflects distance to the nearest sensor, not certainty in the number itself — and coverage only reaches lots near a sensor, so gaps on the map mean no data, not dry ground. Full detail, including validation and coverage limits, is on the methodology page.

For researchers & engineers

Query it directly

Everything above is a friendlier layer over a free REST API and an MCP server — the same 858,284 lots, live FloodNet readings, and flood-risk model, callable from a script or an AI agent with no key and no signup. Full reference on the Developers page.

curl "https://spidernet.app/api/v1/lots?address=350%205th%20Avenue,%20Manhattan"

Connected as MCP, an agent can chain that against a second server for zoning and building-code text — cross-referencing what's built with what the code actually requires, in one conversation.

By role

Start where you are

Student or first-time visitor

Start in plain English below — you don't need to know a single term first.

Researcher or capstone project

Skim the vocabulary, then go straight to Query it directly for API and MCP access you can cite and script against.

Urban planner

Going further is built for you — cross-referencing zoning, land use, and flood exposure across many lots at once.

Architect or engineer

Start with a single address in plain English, then use FAR and zoning-district vocabulary to push into Going further.

Developer

Skip to Query it directly, or head straight to the Developers page for the full REST and MCP reference.