Million Neighborhoods
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The Million Neighborhoods Initiative addresses the challenge of slums and urbanization through the localization of the United Nations’ Agenda 2030 for Global Sustainable Development. It builds a common framework based on extending human capabilities, tools, and data for mapping, urban planning, and coordinating neighborhood solutions to development.
Current Projects
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Sub-Saharan Africa Map
Rapid urbanization in Africa over the last few decades has led to massive shifts in population and the rise of informal settlements that operate without roads, power and sewer lines.
The Sub-Saharan Africa Map provides the first-ever map of population and urban development at the street-block level for sub-Saharan Africa. Using a novel approach, the map estimates population and measures how well connected buildings are to surrounding street networks. This information is crucial because streets serve as the foundation for critical public services, including piped sewers, water lines, transit systems, waste collection, and emergency services.
The project brings together geospatial algorithms, large-scale datasets, and population censuses to simplify the challenge faced by city planners. It helps them identify areas lacking critical public services and supports communities advocating for upgrades within their neighborhoods.
The map was developed by a team of researchers at the University of Chicago, including faculty, staff, and students at the Mansueto Institute for Urban Innovation and Open Spatial Lab at the Data Science Institute (OSL) in consultation with international partners, particularly Slum/Shack Dwellers International (SDI). Computational resources were made available through generous support from the Research Computing Center (RCC).
Community Human Development Index
Background
The Human Development Index (HDI) was developed by Indian economist and philosopher Amartya Sen and researchers at the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) to measure “human capabilities”. The HDI statistic represents a composite of educational attainment, life expectancy, and gross income. It is considered the gold standard for measuring human development and has been used to compare nations.
But the HDI was unable to compare cities or local communities, because the statistic had not been calculated at the neighborhood level.
The Community Human Development Index measures human development at the community level providing the potential for helping neighborhoods and societies address disadvantages.
How it works
The Community HDI starts with the United States, where data is available for all of the points measured in the HDI through the Census. The map “localizes” HDI by calculating it for every U.S. Census tract —a total of over 70,000 communities and each U.S. metropolitan area. Our interactive map allows users to compare different neighborhoods and benchmark them to international HDI values.
We are pursuing similar strategies to measure human development in other nations, with a goal of creating a global picture of localized human development. With this tool, we hope to inspire researchers, community leaders, policymakers, and other stakeholders to make human development a more prominent priority in urban development and devise more comprehensive approaches to practice and policy.
Research
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For the science behind our work, read the following papers:
Measuring Health and Human Development in Cities and Neighborhoods in the United States. Suraj K. Sheth, Luís M. A. Bettencourt.
Worldwide Detection of Informal Settlements via Topological Analysis of Crowdsourced Digital Maps. Soman S, Beukes A, Nederhood C, Marchio N, Bettencourt LMA.
Toward Cities without Slums: Topology and the Spatial Evolution of Neighborhoods Brelsford, C., Martin, T., Hand, J., Luís, M. A. Bettencourt
Optimal Reblocking as a Practical Tool for Neighborhood Development Brelsford, C., Martin, T., Hand, J., Luís, M. A. Bettencourt
Media Coverage
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The City Fix: How Higher Quality Data Can Help Improve Urban Planning and Reduce Inequities
Next City: Mapping Tech Could Formalize Settlements for One Billion People
The City Fix: Act Locally, Learn Globally: Luis Bettencourt on Building from the Community Up
Reuters: African Slum Map Exposes True Scale of Urban Poverty
Forbes: Math Helps Sprawling Cities Grow Sustainably And Reduce Slum Conditions
Mint: The City is Not a Massive Machine