Making Neighborhoods: New York City

In 2014, CHPC released the first Making Neighborhoods report and interactive map studying demographic change in New York City in the decade spanning 2000 to 2010.

A clearer understanding of New York Citys changing population, residential patterns, and how they shape our neighborhoods, is critical in order to spot trends, identify pressing issues, allocate scarce resources, and intercede to address emerging problems.

Because of this, CHPC and lead researcher Raisa Bahchieva conducted the Making Neighborhoods study. This study is based on a 2008 study that analyzed changes between 1990 and 2000.

Making Neighborhoods uses cluster analysis, a common strategy in economic and marketing studies, as a way of parsing large amounts of data into groups with shared traits. Using 16 variables to measure race, age, foreign birth, household/family type, education level, and poverty, our model identified 14 clusters of census tracts where populations share these characteristics.

First, we identified the locations of all of these population clusters in 2000 and then we tracked these clusters 10 years later.

The results reveal whether these population types grew in number or geographic size or moved into new areas; if their numbers declined or they retreated from their neighborhoods and were replaced by others; or if groups remained relatively unchanged in a decade. By following groups of people with shared characteristics, we see a different portrait of a changing city. It is one that New Yorkers will recognize, as it reflects the neighborhoods they make for themselves.

This report summarizes the analysis and findings of the full study:

1. What cluster analysis tells us
2. The major trends revealed
3. The housing conditions that impact the clusters
4. What this means for NYC neighborhoods