Data Mapping: Where Will I Live Next???

(Project Mapping Exercise - click to view.)

Project Narrative:
For this class assignment, I had to create an information map that tells a story using visual design and data sets. I began my process by thinking in the traditional sense of maps; geographical spaces in which information is displayed about various locations on the map. After further probing into the concept of data visualization, I realized that the content chosen can not merely show data, but rather serve a purpose of helping the viewer draw conclusions and make decisions.

Since I plan to move in a few years, I decided to do a comparison of potential cities I would like to relocate to. The cities I chose are Portland, Oregon, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, Charlotte North Carolina, Atlanta, Georgia and Jacksonville, Florida.

At first glance, the project sounded as if it would be a cost of living analysis. A comparison of cost of living based on my current salary was not as interesting or engaging as doing a comparison of factors that I feel are important when considering relocating.

The factors I decided on are People: Ethnic and Gender Identity, Food: Organic/ Alternative Markets, Transportation: Public Transit Systems, Housing: Home Prices, and Education: Tuition.

Here is a breakdown of relevance and importance of each factor.
People: Ethnicity and Gender Identity – Having grown up in the South; being surrounded by people of color; it is a natural desire to live in a city that ethnically diverse. In addition to ethnicity, it is also important to reside in a city that is open and gay friendly.
I originally had three specific ethnic groups identified: African American, White and Latino. I was able to find US Census data on African American and White populations in the cities I targeted, but was not able to find concise numbers on the percentage of Latino in these cities. Therefore, my data set only includes African American and White identified people. It was interesting that I found several articles discussing the growth of the Latino population, but no concrete numbers.

For gender identity, I am referring to the presence of same-sex couples, in particular female to female. Having experienced a spectrum of societal responses from the closed mouth religious dogma of south, to the out and proud rhetoric of the west coast, finding a city in which people are afforded the opportunities to be their whole selves is extremely important.

Food: Organic/ Alternative Markets – Being a health conscious individual, I prefer to shop in grocery stores and markets that offer a wide selection of organic, whole grain, healthy foods. Whole Foods Market and Trader Joes are two of the largest and most popular chain stores within that offer this shopping experience. Therefore I choose to collect data on these two stores.

Transportation: Public Transit Systems –An affordable and accessible public transit system is another priority for choosing my next city to live in. I have focused on the train system versus the bus system because realistically I would not ride the bus that often because they take too long.

Housing: Home Prices – House prices are important in helping to determine if I will be spending more money on a mortgage than I desire.

Education: Tuition – The cost of an education and taking classes is relevant because I identify as a life learner. Having reasonable tuition prices will dictate the feasibility of me to continue to take classes.

Conclusion - Researching and analyzing the data for this assignment provided me with statistical data that will influence my decision on where to live next. Not only does it provide factual analytical data, but also shows a trend of items that are important to me that I did not know existed in some places and in places where I thought items would exist, they do not. This enlightenment paints a different picture of the cities I have researched; in particular Atlanta coming out on the high end of my radar, with Jacksonville falling on the low end.