I’m a sucker for images, and these new graphic representations at the intersection of maps and data are lovely.
A consulting firm out of North Carolina, Urban3, has a new measure for assessing the productivity of land in an urban environment. It’s an interesting new twist.
Urban3 makes maps that show the value of city buildings on a per-acre basis. That last detail is the kicker.
“We make the models to provide information equity,” explained Joe Minicozzi when I asked him about his approach. “We show a financial picture of what’s going on with the cash flow. You see where the holes are, what’s doing well, what’s not doing well. You can’t see where you’re leaking your money if you don’t know what’s going on.”
Per-acre analysis: a unique way of looking at urban economics | MinnPost
The general process is to take the tax revenue on the section of land and divide it by a spatial measure. Under this calculation, downtown buildings are more ‘efficient’ than suburban malls with lots of surrounding acreage of asphalt parking spaces. And in this way the analysis has flaws. Consumer (pre-covid) enjoyed the ease of mall access. Downtowns discourage shopping traffic. So if the objective is to encourage downtown visits, an understanding of transit and traffic and parking would be more valuable.
Reframing a means of analysis is exciting, but there are many more features of the built environment than simply tax collection and land space.
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