Urban and Regional Analysis

The PNCIS Users' Conference is Just One Month Away!

Posted on Wednesday, May 09, 2012 at 11:50 am ET

We're now just one month away from the Pittsburgh Neighborhood and Community Information System (PNCIS) Users' Conference. This year's event features Chris Walker, Director of Research and Assessment at the Local Initiatives Support Corporation. This conference is made possible by our sponsors UCSUR and PPND.

PNCIS Users' Conference
Friday, June 8, 2012
1 pm - 5 pm
University Club, 123 University Place

RSVP: pncis@pitt.edu

Please see the conference flyer for more information.

Impact of Port Authority Route Eliminations

Posted on Wednesday, May 09, 2012 at 11:45 am ET

The Port Authority of Allegheny County has proposed a 35 percent service reduction to cope with a looming $64 million budget shortfall. These proposed cuts will eliminate 46 of 102 routes. Using route data provided by the Port Authority, we were able to create a map of the routes slated for elimination in September if the financial picture remains unchanged.

The proposed route eliminations and service reductions to Allegheny County's transit system will have a severe effect on many riders and communities, especially those losing service entirely. Using block-level data from the 2010 Census and the Census' Local Employment Dynamics Dataset, we estimate that 227,334 County residents will lose reasonable access* to transit from their residence, and 88,825 jobs will no longer be reasonably accessible from a transit line. Following the proposed eliminations, 53 percent of all County residents will still have reasonable access to transit from their home (down from 71 percent), and 71 percent of all County jobs will remain accessible to transit (down from 85 percent). The impact of route eliminations on residents and jobs is shown in the following table.

These affected areas are shown on the map below.

*We define reasonable distance as 2,000 feet (0.38 miles) from a transit line.

Learn more about Livehoods at our April 27th open data event

Posted on Tuesday, April 10, 2012 at 04:36 pm ET

We have had a great response to our open data meeting on April 13, and the meeting hasn't even taken place yet. Please join us for a follow-up event featuring the work of Justin Cranshaw and Dr. Norman Sadeh of Carnegie Mellon on the Livehoods Project.

Friday, April 27, noon-1pm
UCSUR's 1st Floor Conference Room (3343 Forbes Ave)
Feel free to bring a lunch.
RSVP: pncis@pitt.edu

Urban computing is a growing field of computer science that aims to leverage new ubiquitous modes of computation to improve the efficiency of cities and the overall well being of people who live in them. Work in this area is broad and interdisciplinary, ranging from the design of crowd sourcing applications that attempt to better engage citizens, to mining data to better understand traffic flows through the city.

With our work on the Livehoods Project, we introduce a new methodology for studying the dynamics, structure, and character of a city on a large scale using social media and machine learning. Using data such as tweets and check-ins, we are able to discover the hidden structures of the city using clustering algorithms. Our approach reveals a snap-shot of the dynamic areas that comprise the city, which we call Livehoods. Like neighborhoods, Livehoods are a representation of the organizational structure of the city.

However, Livehoods are different from neighborhoods. Livehoods allow us to investigate and explore how people actually use the city, simultaneously shedding light onto the factors that come together to shape the urban landscape and the social texture of city life. In this talk we will present the results of our field study exploring the Livehoods of Pittsburgh.

The presenters are interested in exploring the practical applications of their data in a community context, which may hold particular value for those working in community development, business district management, and market research. This session is intended to be interactive.

Livehoods is a research project from the School of Computer Science at
Carnegie Mellon University.

Presenters: Justin Cranshaw is a PhD student in the School of Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon University. Dr. Norman Sadeh is a Professor of Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon University, where he directs the Mobile Commerce Lab, the MBA Track in Technology Leadership, and the e-Supply Chain Management Lab. He's also co-Director of the School's PhD Program in Computation, Organizations and Society.

Open Data Meeting

Posted on Tuesday, April 03, 2012 at 04:10 pm ET

Are you someone who generates, works with (or would like to work with) public information? Do you see the potential benefits in mobile applications using public data to improve the quality of life in Pittsburgh?

If you are a government staff member, elected official, a journalist, staff or volunteer at a community organization, student or faculty member, hacker, programmer, or just interested in using data, please consider attending our first open data working group meeting on April 13th here at the University of Pittsburgh's Center for Social and Urban Research (UCSUR).

Communities around the world are releasing public data in an open data framework. We would like your input as we explore ways to extend the availability and use of public data and mobile applications in Pittsburgh. At the meeting, we will start the conversation.

Feel free to share this notice with others that may be interested.

When: April 13, 2012, 3-5pm

Where: UCSUR's 1st floor conference room, 3343 Forbes Ave. (across from Magee Womens Hospital)

RSVP: pncis@pitt.edu, or call 412-624-9177

City of Pittsburgh Migration

Posted on Friday, March 30, 2012 at 02:30 pm ET

On Wednesday the U.S. Census Bureau today released estimates from the American Community Survey (ACS) showing how many people migrated from one specific county to another during the course of a year. The ACS compiles data over a five-year period and asks people where they lived one year prior to being surveyed. This data was compiled from survey responses collected from 2005 to 2009.

The 2005-2009 American Community Survey County-to-County Migration Files provide tables for each county in the nation, showing both "inflows" and "outflows. Pennsylvania is one of 12 states where this migration data is also compiled for individual municipalites in addition to county-level summaries.

The tables below show the top originations and destinations of migration flows impacting the City of Pittsburgh. The estimates of migration flows represent the number of people estimated to have moved into or out of the City of Pittsburgh over a year. Data is available for specific municipalities in 12 states which includes Pennsylvania. For other states data is summarized to the county level. For international immigration the origination is summarized to a region of the world. International immigration is only available for inflows of population. Population moving outside of the United States will not be surveyed by the ACS.

For the City of Pittsburgh, the largest inflow of migrants came from nations in Asia, while the largest recorded outflow was to the municipality of Penn Hills in Allegheny County.

More information on the U.S. Census Bureau's County-to-County Migration Flows data is online here.