Racial dot map of the US. 1 dot per person, color-coded by race

[Cirrus]

I was going to post this as a reply to this thread, but honestly it's better as a top-level thing. It's probably been posted before (the data is now 11 years old), but what the hell.

CLICK HERE TO ACCESS THIS EXTREMELY COOL MAP

It's interactive. You can zoom in & out, just like Google Maps.

Here are a few interesting things:

Looking at Detroit, you can see the extreme white/black segregation:


All images are screencaps from the Weldon Cooper Center's Racial Dot Map


Houston by comparison has a lot more mixing:




The uptown area in particular:




LA. The Valley looks like the most diverse part, maybe?




I'm hesitant to post New York, because if you go to the real map and zoom in, it's more integrated than it looks here. Especially Manhattan. I wonder if that will still be true if we get similar maps for 2020.




DC. You can see how the city core and parts of the suburbs are white/black segregated, while a broad stretch of suburbia north and west is extraordinarily diverse. You can also see how the monumental core is a weird donut hole in the city, exactly where you'd expect it to be most dense.





What do you see?

[sopas ej]

Originally Posted by Cirrus

LA. The Valley looks like the most diverse part, maybe?

I'm not sure how you're defining "diverse." Diverse, as in racial integration next-door neighbor diverse, or diverse in the sense that there are whole areas of one kind of race next to whole areas of another kind of race?

To me, the LA Basin is more diverse, this being a closeup of LA west of downtown:


The San Fernando Valley isn't as diverse (fewer Blacks and Asians):


And in the center is where I live, South Pasadena, which is northeast of downtown LA, and in the western San Gabriel Valley, which I consider to be pretty diverse:


And of course this is all just where people resided in 2010; this doesn't show where the different people work, have fun, congregate, shop, etc. So in those areas, you also see diversity, probably even more, because all races tend to shop/have fun at the same activity centers... well, generally speaking. I admit that not EVERYBODY goes to the Slauson Swap Meet, or the Horchateria in Paramount, but I don't see why everybody shouldn't.

[pj3000]

The DC map illustrates what I was talking about in the other thread. That being, the highly diverse suburban areas of Maryland, and to a smaller extent, Virginia.

There’s no real dominance and shows how integrated the NW of DC really is.

[Quixote]

You can basically divide South Florida into two cultural regions: Miami-Dade and Broward/Palm Beach/St. Lucie Counties. In the latter three, not only are whites either a plurality or majority, but Cubans aren't far and away the dominant Latino ethnic group.

Most of South Florida definitely is culturally "Southern," only it has palms instead of pines and larger Jewish and Afro-Caribbean populations. It's Miami's prominence as a Latin American gateway that skews popular perception.

[mhays]

Those separations are pretty stark in some cities. Hopefully people experience some diversity at some point outside their enclaves.

[JManc]

Originally Posted by mhays

Those separations are pretty stark in some cities. Hopefully people experience some diversity at some point outside their enclaves.

My suburb is whiter than a Hallmark Christmas movie and I have to go into town and experience the diversity.

[ilcapo]

Out of curiosity:

Is there a specific reason why US keeps track of race or is it just out of tradition?

I know alot of the big multicultural countries such as Brazil, England and Canada does it too.

But most countries doesn't.

Especially because the US is so mixed, im having difficulties to understand why this is still relevant.

I find these maps intresting and beneficial but only for my personal interests.

[SIGSEGV]

Well, probably the original historical origin in the US is for "correct" apportionment due to the 3/5 compromise.

[Steely Dan]

My neighborhood of Lincoln Square is majority white, but not hallmark christmas card white.

White - 64%
Latino - 19%
Asian - 9%
Black - 4%
Other - 4%


So, certainly not hyper-diverse or anything, but moreso than a typical chicago neighborhood. The main thing majorly out of whack with city-wide percentages is the relative lack of black people, which is of course how it goes in chicago outside of a few rare instances.

[SIGSEGV]

My census tract is 64% white, 19% Asian, 7% Black, 7% Hispanic and 3% multi-racial. Median income is 116,000 (I'm far below that ).

Rogers Park seems to be far and away the most diverse part of the city?

[deja vu]

Originally Posted by Cirrus

Looking at Detroit, you can see the extreme white/black segregation:


All images are screencaps from the Weldon Cooper Center's Racial Dot Map

What do you see?

Yeah, you can pretty much draw a line along 8 Mile Rd. After all these decades. Still.


Philly looks pretty segregated -



Pittsburgh too. Not a lot of Hispanic folks in Pittsburgh -

[pj3000]

Pittsburgh is likely the least Hispanic major city in the US. And even though it’s the state’s second largest, probably the least Hispanic city in PA. And is also incredibly segregated in every way imaginable... the topography lends itself naturally to that and has made it that much easier over the years.

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by deja vu

Yeah, you can pretty much draw a line along 8 Mile Rd. After all these decades. Still.

Not really, though.

I think people are forgetting that these are race and density maps. So a denser area will look different than a less dense area even if they're racially similar.

If you look at 8 Mile, the entire western half is overwhelmingly black, on both sides, and well into suburbia. The eastern half, no, but these are 2010 maps. The largest black increase/white decrease in Metro Detroit over the past decade has been southern Macomb county, so the racial distribution on the 2020 map will largely look the same on both sides of 8 mile.

But the map will still look kinda different on either side of 8 mile, because the density drops as you get north of 8 mile, and especially on the western (more affluent, woodsy, hilly) side. Southfield MI has 90%+ black census tracts that are almost rural-looking, yet a mile from Detroit proper.

[Blitz]

The contrast on either side of Mack Avenue (boundary of Detroit and the Grosse Pointes) is more stark than that of 8 Mile Road.

[SIGSEGV]

Minneapolis looks the most integrated of any Midwest metros:

[BnaBreaker]

I think the Asian dots being red make them really stand out, and thus, makes there appear to be more Asians than there really are.

[SIGSEGV]

Originally Posted by BnaBreaker

I think the Asian dots being red make them really stand out, and thus, makes there appear to be more Asians than there really are.

Agreed! On the map, my neighborhood appears majority Asian, but it's only ~20% Asian.

[SIGSEGV]

OK, now this must have some interesting story here:



(Eagle-eyed forumers may recognize the place from a different post...).

[Steely Dan]

^ LOL!

[SIGSEGV]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

^ LOL!

yeah, I noticed the weird anomaly on this map, then went to Google Maps and was like "no fucking way"