Finding closest line given 2 points using PostGIS?

Question

I have a table t that contains a column line_positions which is of type line. Given 2 points I want to find the closest line that is close enough (less than 10km) and that does not pass too close to a point I want to avoid (20km minimum). Currently I use

SELECT t.*
FROM path t
WHERE
  ST_DWithin(ST_GeographyFromText('Point(69.835 22.596)'), t.line_positions, 10000, FALSE)  AND
  ST_DWithin(ST_GeographyFromText('Point(69.856 22.519)'), t.line_positions, 10000, false) AND
  NOT ST_DWithin(ST_GeographyFromText('Point(-79.804 9.141)'), t.line_positions, 20000, false)
ORDER BY
  ST_Distance(ST_GeographyFromText('Point(69.835 22.576)'), t.line_positions, false) +
  ST_Distance(ST_GeographyFromText('Point(69.856 22.519)'), t.line_positions, false)
  ASC
LIMIT 1

There is a gist index ix_path_line_positions on the line_positions column.

It works but slow, between 3s and 30s for only 100000 rows in t.

explain analyze gives :

Limit  (cost=9.95..9.95 rows=1 width=1432) (actual time=21729.253..21729.254 rows=1 loops=1)
   ->  Sort  (cost=9.95..9.95 rows=1 width=1432) (actual time=21729.251..21729.251 rows=1 loops=1)
         Sort Key: ((_st_distance('0101000020E61000003D0AD7A370755140FA7E6ABC74933640'::geography, line_positions, '0'::double precision, false) + _st_distance('0101000020E6100000105839B4C8765140BE9F1A2FDD843640'::geography, line_positions, '0'::double precision, false)))
         Sort Method: top-N heapsort  Memory: 26kB"
         ->  Index Scan using ix_path_line_positions on path t  (cost=0.28..9.94 rows=1 width=1432) (actual time=93.490..21710.562 rows=690 loops=1)
           Index Cond: ((line_positions && '0101000020E61000003D0AD7A3707551407F6ABC7493983640'::geography) AND (line_positions && '0101000020E6100000105839B4C8765140BE9F1A2FDD843640'::geography))
           Filter: (('0101000020E61000003D0AD7A3707551407F6ABC7493983640'::geography && _st_expand(line_positions, '10000'::double precision)) AND ('0101000020E6100000105839B4C8765140BE9F1A2FDD843640'::geography && _st_expand(line_positions, '10000'::double precision)) AND _st_dwithin('0101000020E61000003D0AD7A3707551407F6ABC7493983640'::geography, line_positions, '10000'::double precision, false) AND _st_dwithin('0101000020E6100000105839B4C8765140BE9F1A2FDD843640'::geography, line_positions, '10000'::double precision, false) AND ((NOT ('0101000020E6100000FA7E6ABC74F353C0D578E92631482240'::geography && _st_expand(line_positions, '20000'::double precision))) OR (NOT (line_positions && '0101000020E6100000FA7E6ABC74F353C0D578E92631482240'::geography)) OR (NOT _st_dwithin('0101000020E6100000FA7E6ABC74F353C0D578E92631482240'::geography, line_positions, '20000'::double precision, false))))
           Rows Removed by Filter: 15365
Planning time: 0.491 ms
Execution time: 21729.321 ms

How could I improve it ? Using geometry calculation instead (but my track could span several thousands km, will the computed distances correct) ? Using <-> KNN operator (but since I order on the sum of 2 distances, it does not seem to use the gist index anyway) ?

Answer 1

Are the two given points always within 10km of each other. If so you could try making the two points a line and performing one ST_DWithin instead of two. That may improve things slightly.

SELECT t.*
FROM path t
WHERE
  ST_DWithin(ST_GeomFromText('LINESTRING(69.835 22.596,69.856 22.519)'), t.line_positions, 10000, FALSE)  
  NOT ST_DWithin(ST_GeographyFromText('Point(-79.804 9.141)'), t.line_positions, 20000, false)
ORDER BY
  ST_Distance(ST_GeographyFromText('Point(69.835 22.576)'), t.line_positions, false) +
  ST_Distance(ST_GeographyFromText('Point(69.856 22.519)'), t.line_positions, false)
  ASC
LIMIT 1