Neighborhood Quality of Life

Generally, individuals consider basic needs such as cost of living, safety and economic security when they choose where to live. Beyond these factors, there exist other desirable amenities that may play pivotal roles in the quality of life within a neighborhood or area.

Our motivating question asks: What amenities do people value? Is there a relationship between community demographics and the amenities available to its residents? Understanding where desirable amenities are located could help evaluate how quality of life may differ across neighborhoods. We produce a visualization to show which neighborhoods in Chicago have these amenities and in what quantities. We create a map of pharmacies, libraries, murals, and Starbucks cafes in Chicago’s 77 neighborhoods. These particular amenities cover a broad array of what might make a neighborhood an appealing place to live: access to healthcare, education beyond schools, arts, and local gathering places/expected change in housing prices, respectively. We also estimate the Shannon Diversity Index to gain a better understanding of the diversity of reachable amenities from any point in the city.

Project code can be found here