why can't I import geopandas?

Question

My only line of code is

import geopandas

and it gives me the error

OSError: Could not find libspatialindex_c library file

has anyone encountered this before? my script was working just fine until this error came up.

**Note that rtree module not found was an issue fisrt, and upon installation I received the above error instead.

You need to install `spatialindex`. https://github.com/libspatialindex/libspatialindex/wiki/1.-Getting-Started — DYZ, Aug 04 '17 at 22:34

score 20 · Answer 1 · edited Jun 20 '20 at 09:12

20

I had the same issue while working in Linux Subsystem at Windows 10 (speaking about this). What helped was installing the version for developers using apt. Namely:

sudo apt install libspatialindex-dev did the job.

I did not need to work with make.

edit: Nice to see my answer has been upvoted so many times; in the time of writing it, however, this was not the most popular answer and it was preceeded by the other answers that suggested using make. This is why I am referring to this command; and I think the other answers are worth reading anyway.

edited Jun 20 '20 at 09:12

Community

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1

answered Sep 03 '18 at 12:57

Vojta F

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any spatialindex packages for centos? – Dee Jan 06 '21 at 08:07

score 14 · Answer 2 · edited Feb 24 '19 at 20:53

14

If you are using MacOS, it's as simple as follow:

brew install spatialindex
pip install rtree

If you are working on linux environment you have to build this from source:

Install spatialindex

curl -L https://github.com/libspatialindex/libspatialindex/archive/1.8.5.tar.gz | tar xz
cd libspatialindex-1.8.5/
./autogen.sh
./configure
make
sudo make install
sudo ldconfig

install rtree: pip install rtree

edited Feb 24 '19 at 20:53

Community

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answered Jan 23 '18 at 17:09

Dhia

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This worked for me on my mac and after quite a while, trying to find a solution (including editing the core.py file in rtree) I am very greatful. I conda installed geopandas, pip installed osmnx, brew installed spatialindex, pip uninstalled rtree and then pip installed rtree and it worked. – Jack Jun 12 '18 at 18:30
2

Left out one step: need to run `./autogen.sh` before you can `./configure`. – Keith Devens Aug 17 '18 at 00:24

score 6 · Answer 3 · edited Oct 29 '20 at 09:11

6

Linux installation steps for Docker users:

RUN apt-get update
RUN apt-get install -y --fix-missing curl autoconf libtool automake
RUN curl -L https://github.com/libspatialindex/libspatialindex/archive/1.8.5.tar.gz | tar -xz
RUN cd libspatialindex-1.8.5 && ./autogen.sh && ./configure && make && make install && ldconfig

edited Oct 29 '20 at 09:11

Community

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answered Aug 16 '18 at 09:54

user667489

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score 1 · Answer 4 · edited Jan 23 '18 at 16:57

1

User DYZ provided the correct answer in the comments.

You need to install spatialindex.

This question should be set to answered so it is not misleading

edited Jan 23 '18 at 16:57

Dhia

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answered Oct 08 '17 at 21:47

Worm

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why can't I import geopandas?

4 Answers4

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