City-Defined Neighborhood Boundaries in the United States
Abstract Neighborhoods are frequently cited as impactful for social, economic, political, and health outcomes. Measuring neighborhoods, however, is challenging, as the definition of a neighborhood may change dramatically across places. Researchers lack widespread but locally-sourced data on neighbor...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Nature Portfolio
2025-06-01
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| Series: | Scientific Data |
| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.1038/s41597-025-05329-6 |
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| author | Stephen Ansolabehere Jacob R. Brown Ryan D. Enos Ben Shair Tyler Simko David Sutton |
| author_facet | Stephen Ansolabehere Jacob R. Brown Ryan D. Enos Ben Shair Tyler Simko David Sutton |
| author_sort | Stephen Ansolabehere |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Abstract Neighborhoods are frequently cited as impactful for social, economic, political, and health outcomes. Measuring neighborhoods, however, is challenging, as the definition of a neighborhood may change dramatically across places. Researchers lack widespread but locally-sourced data on neighborhoods, and instead often adopt widely available but arbitrary Census geographies as neighborhood proxies. Others invest in the collection of more precise definitions, but these types of data are hard to collect at scale. We address this tension between scale and precision by collecting, cleaning, and providing to researchers a new dataset of city-defined neighborhoods. Our data includes 206 of the largest cities in the United States, covering more than 77 million people. We combine these data with block-level Census demographic data and provide them along with open-source software to aid researchers in their use. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-b3c44fe9e2ac4a61a6c8a65fed90380d |
| institution | DOAJ |
| issn | 2052-4463 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2025-06-01 |
| publisher | Nature Portfolio |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Scientific Data |
| spelling | doaj-art-b3c44fe9e2ac4a61a6c8a65fed90380d2025-08-20T03:22:46ZengNature PortfolioScientific Data2052-44632025-06-011211810.1038/s41597-025-05329-6City-Defined Neighborhood Boundaries in the United StatesStephen Ansolabehere0Jacob R. Brown1Ryan D. Enos2Ben Shair3Tyler Simko4David Sutton5Harvard University, Department of GovernmentBoston University, Department of Political ScienceHarvard University, Department of GovernmentUniversity of RochesterPrinceton University, Department of PoliticsHarvard University, Department of GovernmentAbstract Neighborhoods are frequently cited as impactful for social, economic, political, and health outcomes. Measuring neighborhoods, however, is challenging, as the definition of a neighborhood may change dramatically across places. Researchers lack widespread but locally-sourced data on neighborhoods, and instead often adopt widely available but arbitrary Census geographies as neighborhood proxies. Others invest in the collection of more precise definitions, but these types of data are hard to collect at scale. We address this tension between scale and precision by collecting, cleaning, and providing to researchers a new dataset of city-defined neighborhoods. Our data includes 206 of the largest cities in the United States, covering more than 77 million people. We combine these data with block-level Census demographic data and provide them along with open-source software to aid researchers in their use.https://doi.org/10.1038/s41597-025-05329-6 |
| spellingShingle | Stephen Ansolabehere Jacob R. Brown Ryan D. Enos Ben Shair Tyler Simko David Sutton City-Defined Neighborhood Boundaries in the United States Scientific Data |
| title | City-Defined Neighborhood Boundaries in the United States |
| title_full | City-Defined Neighborhood Boundaries in the United States |
| title_fullStr | City-Defined Neighborhood Boundaries in the United States |
| title_full_unstemmed | City-Defined Neighborhood Boundaries in the United States |
| title_short | City-Defined Neighborhood Boundaries in the United States |
| title_sort | city defined neighborhood boundaries in the united states |
| url | https://doi.org/10.1038/s41597-025-05329-6 |
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