Densest census tracts of midwestern cities from U.S Census Bureau

[denvernative1982]

Number of people square mile in densest census tract of Midwestern cities..
Chicago, IL 90,683
Milwaukee, WI 29,432
Denver, CO 25,970 (Capitol Hill neighborhood)
Minneapolis,MN 25,688
Columbus,OH 25,250 (Area around OSU)
Pittsburgh,PA 25,233
Cleveland, OH 20,264
Cincinnati, OH 20,197
Detroit, MI 17,071
St. Paul 15,511
St.Louis, MO 15,245
Omaha, NE 15,087
Kansas City, MO 13,531
Lincoln, NE 12,886
Indianapolis, IN 12,240
Colorado Springs, CO 12,112
Louisville, KY 11,225
Fargo, ND 8077
Wichita, KS 7938
Des Moines, IA 7976
Sioux Falls, SD 6876

Milwaukee is actually 2nd as far as having the densest census tract of any mid-western cities!!

I would have thought Louisville, Kentucky would be higher up on the list

[EastSider]

Where'd you get these stats?

[JivecitySTL]

Denver, Pittsburgh and Louisville are not Midwest cities. And a link would be nice.

[milehi]

Again, where else to put Denver except in this forum!!!! Colorado is listed as a state in this forum. Are you afraid to compare your city with Denver? What is Denver? Midwest, west, southwetst?

[JivecitySTL]

^No, it's just a Rocky Mountain (Western) state, not a Midwestern state. Common sense would tell most people that it doesn't belong here.

[SChristopher]

Mountain West....the wild frontier...for purposes of this site....its probably more midwest than west coast.

[Lmichigan]

You guys do know that census tracts are ALL sizes.

I mean, come on. Fargo?

[JivecitySTL]

Yes, census tracts vary as widely as city boundaries. There is no real consistent measure of city population density in urban areas.

[VanillaVille]

Basically all this is saying is that the three low surprises - Detroit, St. Louis, and Louisville don't have any real small census tracts that contain nothing but high density single building residential units. Those three cities all have many dense single building residential units, but they are obviously located in larger census tracts.

[JivecitySTL]

I would love to better understand how census tracts are designated.

[qwerty1324]

^There is no rhyme or reason. Using zip codes is like using census tracts too. They vary in geographical size and the area they cover for no apparent reason.

[VanillaVille]

Here in Franklin County, we have census tract 94.92 which has 10,186 people in 17.31 square miles for 588.5 people per square mile. Then we have census tract 18.10 which has 3,838 people living in 0.15 square miles for a density of 25,255.5 people per square mile.

The Chicago one is hilarious. Cook County census tract 811 has 3,718 people living in a few high rise buildings within the 0.04 square mile census tract for a density of 90,614.2 people per square mile.

[LouisvilleS]

I wonder what areas these Census tracts cover, because I remember playing around on the Census website a couple of years ago and I found that the Deer Park neighborhood in Louisville had a density of around 28,000 ppl/sq. mile.

[40748246]

Again, where else to put Denver except in this forum!!!! Colorado is listed as a state in this forum. Are you afraid to compare your city with Denver? What is Denver? Midwest, west, southwetst?

I wouldn`t be afraid to compare Milwaukee to Denver!

[bmc343]

OK how accurate can those stats really be? I mean, it's JUST using the capitol hill neighborhood! That's like using downtown or uptown MPLS for the density stats. Does anybody have any better stats?

[boomper]

Where is this Milwaukee tract located with this density?

[qwerty1324]

The EastSide neighborhood of Milwaukee is the most dense neighborhood in the midwest not including Chicago.

[Fiddlerontheruf]

The EastSide neighborhood of Milwaukee is the most dense neighborhood in the midwest not including Chicago.


Actually, surpsingly, this neighborhood is on the southside, in a mainly hispanci area. I was surprised, too. Milwaukee has about 10 tracts with over 20,000 people/sq mile, though. (http://factfinder.census.gov/servlet/ThematicMapFramesetServlet?_bm=y&-_MapEvent=displayBy&-errMsg=&-_dBy=140&-redoLog=false&-_zoomLevel=&-tm_name=DEC_2000_SF1_U_M00090&-tm_config=|b=50|l=en|t=4001|zf=0.0|ms=thm_def|dw=0.23913985648987968|dh=0.13164834615121063|dt=gov.census.aff.domain.map.EnglishMapExtent|if=gif|cx=-87.93661718580135|cy=43.01634913299229|zl=5|pz=5|bo=|bl=|ft=350:349:335:389:388:332:331|fl=381:403:204:380:369:379:368|g=16000US5553000|ds=DEC_2000_SF1_U|sb=50|tud=false|db=150|mn=195|mx=40833|cc=1|cm=1|cn=5|cb=|um=Persons/Sq%20Mile|pr=0|th=DEC_2000_SF1_U_M00090&-PANEL_ID=tm_result&-_pageY=&-_lang=en&-geo_id=16000US5553000&-_pageX=&-_mapY=&-_mapX=&-_latitude=&-_pan=&-ds_name=DEC_2000_SF1_U&-_longitude=&-_changeMap=Identify)

[qwerty1324]

That's a census tract which is very differnt than a neighborhood.

[Fiddlerontheruf]

That's a census tract which is very differnt than a neighborhood.


yeah, but he said tract. ;)

And either way, the near southside ARE the most dense neighborhoods in the city. Milwaukee's East side maybe more dense on some blocks, but the southside neighborhoods are denser. At least according to census.gov.

I know, its surprises me too.

[hudkina]

Milwaukee's southside has 83,000 people living in an area of less than 5 sq. mi. It has a density of 17,505 ppsm. There 25 census tracts that make up this area all have a density greater than 10,000. The closest that Detroit comes is having 107,000 people in an area a little less than 10 sq. mi. It's density is only 11,110 ppsm. Again, the 25 census tracts that make up northeast Detroit all have a density greater than 10,000 ppsm.

[qwerty1324]

Milwaukee's southside has 83,000 people living in an area of less than 5 sq. mi.
Source please.

[gych]

Yeah, Louisville is a very dense city...surely at least as dense if not more than many cities listed. Many ppl are surprised by this but you have to remember Louisville has always been a Midwest industrial city that attracted hoardes of immigrants and was very dense. One of those old dense hoods housed a baseball park for the Louisville Greys, an original member of the National League of the MLB. Well, as you can see, the city regressed and let KY infect it with backwardness in the 20th century, but we are slowly staking our claim at being a top 25 city again. As for now, we will have to settle for top 50.

[hudkina]

Source please.

http://www.census.gov

http://www.downriverdetroit.net/milwaukee.gif

--------------------------------------------------------------
RANK GEOGRAPHY POPULATION AREA DENSITY
--------------------------------------------------------------

1. Census Tract 160 3,029 .15 mi² 19,838.1 ppsm
2. Census Tract 159 3,645 .18 mi² 19,908.6 ppsm
3. Census Tract 158 3,381 .17 mi² 20,397.6 ppsm
4. Census Tract 157 3,742 .19 mi² 19,757.6 ppsm
5. Census Tract 161 3,232 .23 mi² 14,163.6 ppsm
6. Census Tract 162 3,311 .18 mi² 18,543.0 ppsm
7. Census Tract 163 5,197 .22 mi² 23,842.6 ppsm
8. Census Tract 164 5,180 .18 mi² 29,410.6 ppsm
9. Census Tract 165 2,770 .19 mi² 14,539.8 ppsm
10. Census Tract 171 2,506 .25 mi² 10,157.9 ppsm
11. Census Tract 170 5,348 .27 mi² 19,711.9 ppsm
12. Census Tract 169 3,946 .19 mi² 21,282.1 ppsm
13. Census Tract 168 3,232 .20 mi² 15,928.0 ppsm
14. Census Tract 167 3,408 .19 mi² 18,049.1 ppsm
15. Census Tract 166 2,381 .19 mi² 12,437.4 ppsm
16. Census Tract 172 2,157 .17 mi² 12,364.4 ppsm
17. Census Tract 173 3,372 .20 mi² 17,153.1 ppsm
18. Census Tract 174 2,732 .12 mi² 21,897.9 ppsm
19. Census Tract 175 4,169 .19 mi² 22,439.7 ppsm
20. Census Tract 176 3,093 .18 mi² 17,107.2 ppsm
21. Census Tract 177 1,716 .16 mi² 11,002.6 ppsm
22. Census Tract 187 3,509 .19 mi² 18,573.4 ppsm
23. Census Tract 186 2,688 .19 mi² 14,340.1 ppsm
24. Census Tract 204 2,653 .19 mi² 14,141.8 ppsm
25. Census Tract 205 2,512 .19 mi² 13,567.2 ppsm
--------------------------------------------------------------
TOTAL: 82,909 4.74 mi² 17,504.8 ppsm

[qwerty1324]

Cool thank you.

Could you provide a link to the actual area within the census.gov, it is a huge site, that has the map of census tracts and the chart listing the census tracts population and size. The properties on your post didn't have it.

[hudkina]

Map (http://factfinder.census.gov/servlet/ThematicMapFramesetServlet?_bm=y&-tree_id=4001&-context=tm&-all_geo_types=N&-redoLog=false&-tm_name=DEC_2000_SF1_U_M00090&-tm_config=|b=50|l=en|t=4001|zf=0.0|ms=thm_def|dw=0.7971328549661894|dh=0.4388278205039935|dt=gov.census.aff.domain.map.EnglishMapExtent|if=gif|cx=-87.9685025|cy=43.0578915|zl=6|pz=6|bo=|bl=|ft=|fl=|g=16000US5553000|ds=DEC_2000_SF1_U|sb=50|tud=false|db=140|mn=195|mx=29432|cc=1|cm=4|cn=2|cb=195:9999:10000:29432|um=Persons/Sq%20Mile|pr=0|th=DEC_2000_SF1_U_M00090&-PANEL_ID=tm_classes&-MinValue=195&-_lang=en&-geo_id=16000US5553000&-LastMax=max5&-format=&-ds_name=DEC_2000_SF1_U&-MaxValue=29432)

Data (http://factfinder.census.gov/servlet/CTTable?_lang=en&_ts=137512840647)

The data only lists the population and area in square meters of each census tract. You'll have to convert the square meters into square miles and then divide the population by that number to determine the density of each census tract.

[mhays]

I'm shocked that there aren't denser tracts in some of these cities.

Hell, even here in Seattle we have a couple tracts in the 40s and others in the 30s, and we're far from dense by my book. The top two were about 42,500/sm and 45,000/sm in 2000, and of course more now. One is on Capitol Hill near downtown and the other is near the UW. Neither is very small, at 127 and 129 acres. Neither includes what I consider our densest districts (that would be parts of Belltown and First Hill), and neither has a single high-rise.

[Steely Dan]

seattle has never had to deal with the issues of racism, deindustrialization and urban abondonment on a level coming anywhere remotely close to what the rustbelt cities have gone through. many rustbelt cities like cincy and st. louis are structurally dense (moreso than even seattle at the neighborhood level), it's just that a lot of the people have left.

[hudkina]

Also, you have to remember that a lot of Rust Belt cities have large swathes of industrial areas mixed in with their residential areas. A Census Tract may only have a density of 10,000 ppsm, but when half of the census tract is a huge steel mill, you have to realize that the actual human density is much higher than 10,000 ppsm.

For instance, 34% of the land in St. Louis is unpopulated. That means that over 1/3 of the land is dedicated to parks, industry, etc. In reality, the populated portion of St. Louis actually has a total density of 8,528 ppsm. On the other hand, only 14% of the land in Seattle is unpopulated, so that means that the populated portion of Seattle actually has a total density of 7,859 ppsm.

I think the difference between Seattle and St. Louis is that Seattle has areas of very high density surrounded by areas of low density, while St. Louis' density is pretty even throughout. That shows as even though nearly 10% of Seattle residents live on blocks with a density greater than 40,000 ppsm, only about 54% of the population lives in blocks with a density greater than 10,000 ppsm. St. Louis on the other hand has only about 2% of its population living on blocks with a density greater than 40,000 ppsm, but 62% on blocks with a density greater than 10,000 ppsm.

Here's a breakdown for each city:

Seattle
DENSITY POPULATION % AREA %
------------------------------------------------
40,000+ 53,945 9.6% 0.80 0.9%
20,000-39,999 74,774 13.3% 2.77 3.3%
10,000-19,999 173,669 30.8% 13.33 15.9%
5,000-9,999 205,002 36.4% 28.20 33.6%
1,000-4,999 53,129 9.4% 18.37 21.9%
0-999 2,855 0.5% 8.21 9.8%
no population 0 0.0% 12.16 14.5%

St. Louis

DENSITY POPULATION % AREA %
------------------------------------------------
40,000+ 5,950 1.7% 0.10 0.2%
20,000-39,999 38,714 11.1% 1.60 2.6%
10,000-19,999 170,084 48.8% 12.73 20.6%
5,000-9,999 106,105 30.5% 14.01 22.6%
1,000-4,999 26,044 7.5% 8.72 14.1%
0-999 1,292 0.4% 3.67 5.9%
no population 0 0.0% 21.08 34.0%

[JTS LOU]

YEP... Louisville barely beat FARGO.... WTF lol.. that makes me laugh..

[milwaukeeunseen]

While the Southside doesn't have a whole lot of apartment blocks like the Eastside, there are tons of houses on extremely narrow lots down there. Two or three little houses on the same narrow lot is not uncommon.

You see alot of houses on the Southside with high-cielinged basements. There's a name for this housing type -- the Polish flat. The Polish workers who built these houses included habitable basements for family members to stay in when they first arrived from Poland. Today the Hispanic population uses the Polish flats for the same purpose.

[mhays]

Hudkina, that all sounds about right to me. Looks like good research. Fascinating!

Seattle is a bungalow town, interspersed with apartment districts, particularly in the middle areas. Not only are most areas populated, but we have an extremely low percentage of vacant lots.

I'd love to see the same thing for other cities. Not that it's my job to give you assignments or anything!

[hudkina]

The only other numbers I have offhand are Detroit:

DENSITY POPULATION % AREA %
------------------------------------------------
40,000+ 8,100 0.9% 0.11 0.1%
20,000-39,999 55,909 5.9% 2.29 1.6%
10,000-19,999 505,651 53.2% 38.81 28.0%
5,000-9,999 311,620 32.8% 40.23 29.0%
1,000-4,999 66,745 7.0% 21.79 15.7%
0-999 3,245 0.3% 8.42 6.1%
no population 0 0.0% 27.09 19.5%

As you can see Detroit has virtually no highly dense blocks, with less than 1% of the population living on blocks with a density greater than 40,000. Heck, less than 7% is on blocks over 20,000. However, it really picks up in the 10,000+ area, with 60% of the population living on blocks with a density greater than 10,000. This lends to the fact that Detroit with its larger boundaries (139 sq. mi.) encompasses a greater portion of less-dense single-family homes, though still tightly packed. Also, many of the blocks that would otherwise be over 20,000 really emptied out over the last 40 years.

BTW, with over 27 sq. mi. of unpopulated land, Detroit's populated portion has a density on par with St. Louis' at 8,521 ppsm.

I can do some more, but it may take a while for some of the larger cities.

[hudkina]

Cincinnati
DENSITY POPULATION % AREA %
------------------------------------------------
40,000+ 8,098 2.4% 0.11 0.1%
20,000-39,999 25,518 7.7% 0.97 1.2%
10,000-19,999 83,379 25.2% 6.40 8.2%
5,000-9,999 129,260 39.0% 18.50 23.7%
1,000-4,999 81,671 24.7% 28.68 36.8%
0-999 3,359 1.0% 11.48 14.7%
no population 0 0.0% 11.81 15.2%

Cincinnati tends to be more like Seattle. A good portion of its population lives on highly-dense blocks, but much of the rest of the city tends to be much, much less dense. Over 10% of the population lives on blocks with a density greater than 20,000, but barely 35% of the population lives on blocks over 10,000 ppsm. In fact, just like Seattle, the largest portion of its population lives on blocks between 5,000 and 9,999 ppsm. This shows that despite having a highly dense core, Cincinnati's surrounding neighborhoods tend to have a low density.


The populated portion of Cincinnati has a density of 5,009 ppsm.

[bmc343]

That is some great information. Do you have any data on Minneapolis/St.Paul?

[STLgasm]

No need to get technical-- this is what my city looks like and pictures don't lie. St. Louis is old-style density and while it may not be as populated as it used to be, it still feels like a real city, which is good enough for me...

http://www.pbase.com/stlouis_314/image/45204185.jpg

http://www.pbase.com/stlouis_314/image/45204186.jpg

http://www.pbase.com/stlouis_314/image/45204187.jpg

(Thanks Arch City for the great aerials)

[Fiddlerontheruf]

No need to get technical-- this is what my city looks like and pictures don't lie. St. Louis is old-style density and while it may not be as populated as it used to be, it still feels like a real city, which is good enough for me...


(Thanks Arch City for the great aerials)

Yes, while STL is very dense in some areas, it also has the norths ide where it is not uncommon to find many many consecutive city blocks with NO ONE living on them. BUt nice pics.

[Markitect]

You're reposting pictures we've already seen Fiddler...get rid of them.

[ReddAlert]

thats like you main pet peeve isnt it Mark? :)

[Markitect]

It's unecessary (especially in this case, since the original pictures are in the post right above his) and slows everything down for those of us with dial-up.

It is more of a courtesy and common netiquette issue really (the same goes for people who quote long passages only to make some short comment without snipping out all the irrelvant stuff).

[Bonjourtoledo]

We know that the most densest census tract would be in Chicago perhaps in the Halsted area or the Gold Coast. Lord knows any other cities in the midwest is pretty spaced out since the last several decades has been nothing but urban sprawl from the core city. And YES--that applies to Twin Cities, KC, St. Louis, Cincy, Indy, Motown, and many other cities.