HOW DOES INDYVITALS DEFINE NEIGHBORHOODS?
IndyVitals measures the health and stability of 99 communities
in Marion County. The city has far more neighborhoods. How were
the 99 boundaries drawn?
First, the why: the City of Indianapolis
needed to:
• Have distinct geographic areas for
statistical reporting purposes.
The boundaries do not necessarily
correspond to the way community
organizers typically define a
neighborhood with the same name,
and in many cases these geographic
areas are home to multiple community
and neighborhood organizations.
• Encourage better coordination of
public and private initiatives in
those areas through a common set
of indicators in order to align diverse
planning partners toward a common How the Data are Calculated
The data for IndyVitals comes from
goal.
multiple data sources, with the SAVI
• Better organize municipal government
Community Information System
using common “building blocks” of
(savi.org) being the primary source.
neighborhood geographies.
Multiple methods are used to calculate
data for the neighborhood boundaries:
Next, the how: When drawing the
• When possible, address-level data are
boundaries, the City of Indianapolis
used to obtain an exact count or value
gave consideration to historical
of the item being measured.
maps; excluded city and included
• For other data, the statistics were
town boundaries; parcel and land use
obtained by assigning census tracts
development patterns; major barriers
and parcel boundaries to approximate
like rivers, railroads, and interstates; and
each neighborhood boundary.
self-defined boundaries of community
organizations. Boundaries follow parcel
borders or street centerlines.
•
When counts are used
(e.g., population), the block
boundaries are used to approximate
the neighborhood boundary.
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