Did you know subscribers now have the option to choose what geography any section in a report uses to aggregate data by. In our recent post about the unique rules for custom regions, we stated that “GeoSteps” are used to determine the default geography used to aggregate data in reports. This rule was created to make PolicyMap run faster and be more responsive when creating reports.

We realize though, users are also looking to gather more detailed information for a custom region, so we’ve added a new feature to the following reports: Community Profile Report, Rental Housing Report, and Home Sale Report. This feature is called, the Report Chooser. Now, when you create a report for a custom region or radius, the Report Chooser feature gives you the option to have each section aggregate to any available geography for that dataset.

Why is the Report Choose an important new feature? In our blog entry regarding the 50% Rule, you will remember that only locations which have at least 50% of its area contained within a custom region will be used when aggregating data. The Report Chooser will now allow a smaller geography to apply the 50% Rule to, giving an aggregation using more granular data (i.e. census tracts or blockgroups) and possibly containing a more accurate grouping of geographies for a custom region/radius.

In this example, we have made a 2.5 mile radius from Soldier Field, home of the Chicago Bears football team. Because of the size of the radius, the default geography used for aggregating in the radius are census tracts. With the new Report Chooser, we now have the option to select a smaller geography, like blockgroups, to aggregate data by.

(The highlighted areas meet the 50% Rule and will be included in aggregation. The dark black boundaries are census tracts and the lighter grey are blockgroups. Notice that areas not originally included when using census tracts are now included in blockgroups. In particular, the northwest area.)

To use the new Report Chooser feature, simply create a Community Profile Report, Rental Housing Report, and Home Sale Report for a custom region or radius. In each section of data, you will see new fields that display the source of the data, the geography used to aggregate the area, and the number of geography(ies) used in the aggregation. Select from the drop down menu to choose a different geography to aggregate the section by, as shown on the image on the left. The section will refresh to re-calculate the data. It should take a few seconds or more to refresh, depending on the size of your custom region or radius and how many geographies the section is using to recalculate by.

Here are some useful notes regarding the Report Chooser feature:

• The feature is only available to reports created for custom regions or radius. Reports for predefined geographies will simply show the source of the data for each section.
• If your custom region or radius is too small, you will not be able to select a larger geography than the default.
• Assembled custom regions will default to the geography used to create the custom region. (i.e. a custom region created by assembling county subdivisions, will default to the county subdivision for aggregation.)
• If the geography used to assemble a custom region does not exist in the dataset, then the GeoSteps will be used to determine the default geography used for aggregation. (i.e. a custom region created by assembling zip codes, will default to the census tract for aggregation.)
• Only the geographies that are used in the GeoSteps for a dataset is shown in the drop down menu.

Changing the “Aggregated By” will also change the “Contains:” list and count. This is helpful to know exactly what geographies were used in the calculation.

As you can see, the Report Chooser is a new feature with a very unique function. The ability to use smaller geographies to aggregate data by can help give a more accurate representation of data. For more information or if you would like to join a training, contact our support team at pmap@policymap.com or call us at (866) 923-MAPS.

To read a full guide on all features on PolicyMap, please look at our Primer available here. If you wanted to know more about a feature or topic, send your request to info@policymap.com subject “Did you Know…”

Sincerely,
The PolicyMap Team

Did you know the custom region feature for subscribers gives users the ability to draw right on top of the map to create their own target areas. Once a custom region is drawn, users can then open a custom region in the Tables feature to see aggregated counts or list of geographies that make up the custom region; or open in Reports to get aggregated numbers.

A custom region can contain any geography and cross multiple geographic boundaries and boundary types; we decided to create a blog serie and review some of the unique rules for custom regions to make sense of how data is aggregated and how custom regions display data.

Geography by Assembled Custom Region – The geography which was used to assemble a custom region will be the default geography used to aggregate data. For example, if you assemble a custom region by blockgroups, then the default geography used in reports or tables are blockgroups. This is helpful if you want to download data using the See Values features in Tables. Simply assemble a custom region on the Maps page by the geography you want to download data for, and the See Values will default to that geography.

Donuts in Assembled Custom Regions – When assembling a custom region by selecting the geographies around an area, PolicyMap will automatically fill in the middle of the “donut” when saved, but will only use the geographies selected to aggregate. PolicyMap will not include the geographies in the middle of the “donut”, even though the shaded area is filled in. In the example on the right, the highlighted area will only be used in aggregation but the custom region will “fill in” the area inside the donut when saved.

Non-contiguous Assembled Custom Regions – Assembling a custom region has a unique feature, it allows a custom region to contain geographies that do not have contiguous borders or borders which do not touch each other. In the example below, a user wanted to get aggregated data for specific census tracts throughout downtown Los Angeles, CA. The user is able to individually select each census tract to create a custom region. The custom region can then be opened in Tables to download data for the selected census tracts or in Reports to get aggregated data for the selected census tracts also.

Example of assembling a non-contiguous custom region

While there is not a limit on how many geographies can be selected when assembling a custom region, the total number will increase the amount of time it takes PolicyMap to process and save the custom region.

If there are any unanswered questions about the custom regions feature or you would like to learn more about PolicyMap, join us in our free weekly training or contact us at pmap@policymap.com.

To read a full guide on all features on PolicyMap, please look at our Primer available here. If you wanted to know more about a feature or topic, send your request to info@policymap.com subject “Did you Know…”

Sincerely,
The PolicyMap Team

Did you know the custom region feature for subscribers gives users the ability to draw right on top of the map to create their own target areas. Once a custom region is drawn, users can then open a custom region in the Tables feature to see aggregated counts or list of geographies that make up the custom region; or open in Reports to get aggregated numbers.

A custom region can contain any geography and cross multiple geographic boundaries and boundary types; we decided to create a blog series and review some of the unique rules for custom regions to make sense of how data is aggregated and how custom regions display data.

The Geography Steps – The geography used to aggregate data for a custom region is determined by the size of the custom region, which in turn determines the zoom level the custom region displays at. When you open a custom region, the location of the zoom bar will determine what geography by default will be used to aggregate data. This is also called the default zoom level.

The Zoom Bar on the right shows the numerical scale used for identifying the current zoom level on the map. The zoom level of zero (0) at the bottom is the farthest zoomed out (usually displaying the US and data by states) and 15 at the top is the closest zoomed in (this will show street level and data at blockgroups). 2 is the default zoom level when you first open PolicyMap.

GeoSteps is a term used to determine what geography data can be downloaded at using See Values or what default geography is used for aggregation in Reports. The chart below shows the GeoSteps used for 2000/2010 Census and American Community Survey data. Between zoom levels 12-15 (the top most zoom levels of the Zoom Bar), blockgroups will be used to aggregate data as a default. After the zoom level of 12, census tracts would be the default geography, then counties will be the default at level 8, and finally state level data after zoom level 5.

• 12: Block Group
• 08: Census Tract, Block Group
• 05: County, Census Tract, Block Group
• 00: State, County, Census Tract, Block Group

In the first example on the left, the custom region’s default zoom level is at 12 which would mean that the green highlighted census tracts will be used as the default geographies when aggregating data in reports or shown in Tables.
   
The second example on the right, the custom region is much larger in geographic size encompassing many counties near Chicago, IL so the default zoom level when loading the custom region is 6. This means that counties will be the default geography used to aggregate data and the green highlighted counties will be used for aggregation in reports and tables.

A couple of the reasons for the GeoSteps:

• To make PolicyMap fast and responsive to users, we needed to scale the amount of resources used when aggregating data so the GeoStep allowed the program to select larger geographies that covered more area to aggregate by. (For example, it’s faster to aggregate data for the 67 counties of Pennsylvania than the 10,387 blockgroups)
• Another reason was to help users make sense the geographies that make up a location. (For example, it’s easier understand a list of data for the 50 states that make up the US, than a list of the +200,000 blockgroups in the US)

On the latter point, keep an eye out for our upcoming releases as we plan to give users the ability to choose the geography used to aggregate reports and eventually choose to the geography to download in the Tables feature also.

In our final Custom Region blog entry, we will talk about the unique rules accompanying the ability to assemble custom regions.

To read a full guide on all features on PolicyMap, please look at our Primer available here. If you wanted to know more about a feature or topic, send your request to info@policymap.com subject “Did you Know…”

Sincerely,
The PolicyMap Team

Did you know the custom region feature for subscribers gives users the ability to draw right on top of the map to create their own target areas. Once a custom region is drawn, users can then open a custom region in the Tables feature to see aggregated counts or list of geographies that make up the custom region; or open in Reports to get aggregated numbers.

A custom region can contain any geography and cross multiple geographic boundaries and boundary types; we decided to create a blog serie and review some of the unique rules for custom regions to make sense of how data is aggregated and how custom regions display data.

The 50% Rule – For a geography to be included in the aggregation of a report or table, at least 50% of a geography must be contained by a custom region. This is a helpful rule for creating a radius custom region or radius report. PolicyMap will only use the geographies that have at least 50% of its area contained within the radius boundary for aggregation in a report or table. The 50% Rule also helps when drawing a custom region, since users do not have to be fully accurate in the borders. As long as the drawn border does not cross to contain more than 50% of a geography, it will then not be included in the aggregation.

In the first example on the right, only the green shaded census tracts (38.02, 38.03, 37.02, 35.01, & 34.01) would be used when aggregating data. Tracts 37.01, 35.02, and 34.02 do not have at least 50% of their area contained within the radius custom region.

In the second example below, we have drawn a custom region following streets but these streets do not correspond to the underlying census tract boundaries. Because of the 50% Rule, our custom region will use the green highlighted census tracts (37.02, 34.01, 33.01, 34.02, & 33.02) when aggregating data, while 36.01, 38.03, and 35.01 are not included since at least 50% of their area are not contained within the custom region.

Because there is not a logical or accurate way to divide the data for a geography that is divided by the border of a custom region, we feel that the 50% Rule identifies the areas that a user most likely wanted to collect data for.

In our next Custom Region blog entry, we will talk about the geography rule which determines what geographic boundary is used when aggregating a custom region.

To read a full guide on all features on PolicyMap, please look at our Primer available here. If you wanted to know more about a feature or topic, send your request to info@policymap.com subject “Did you Know…”

Sincerely,
The PolicyMap Team

Did you know subscribers and trial users can generate a detailed report for a pre-defined location, radius around an address, or custom region. PolicyMap built each report by grouping together similar datasets that help describe a location. Users can generate as many reports for as many locations needed without additional costs. All reports use the latest data available in PolicyMap, so what you see on the maps and tables, can quickly be turned into a report.

First, choose the type of report you wish to generate. Each report was created with the idea that the data in a report will better describe the area you selected. Here are descriptions of each report:

• The Community Profile is a snapshot of life in area, including information on its population, racial composition, age, income, workforce, and much more. See a sample Community Profile report here.
• The Rental Housing Report includes rent information by bedroom size, income, and affordability data. See a sample rental report here.
• The IRS Tax Report offers information about the types of deductions residents make on their income tax returns. For example, you can find out how many tax filers are making contributions to an IRA, contributing to charities, or claiming the EITC. See a sample IRS report here.
• The HDMA Report is a summary of the number, typical amount, and type of home mortgages origins, including high-cost lending activity and high interest loans by race or ethnicity. See a sample HMDA report here.
• The Home Sale Report provides a summary of the number of sales, median sale amount, aggregate sale amount, and loan-to-value ratio for 2006-2009 annually and for all quarters of 2007, 2008, and 2009, along with housing market trends between 2000 and 2009. See a sample home sale report here.
• The Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia HMDA report is a series of detailed data tables from HMDA, designed by the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia. This report focuses on the number, median amount, and percent of originated loans by various characteristics, including government insurance, rate spread, loan type, loan purpose, and race of loan applicant.

Once you have selected which report to generate, you can decide what area the report will generate. There are many unique ways to select or create that area:

Pre-defined Locations – To generate a report based on a pre-defined location such as a state, county or census tract, click “Pre-defined Location”. Select a location by entering a zip code, city, state, county or other geography. (A pre-defined geography cannot be an address). You can also generate a report for census tracts, Congressional and State districts, school districts, and Metro Areas. Use these tabs to find one of these areas just as you would on the Map page. Click GO and then click the Generate Report button on the page that follows.

Radius – To generate a report for the area around an address, click “Radius”. Specify the center of the radius by typing in an address. Enter the full address; including zip code and click Go. Your report area, with a default radius of half a mile (0.5), will appear on the map. You can change the size of the radius by typing in a new size in the “specify radius” box at the top of the page. Click GO. The map will redraw with the radius you have chosen as a highlighted orange region. When you are ready to create the report, click Generate Report.

Custom Region – To create a report based on a region of your choosing, click “Custom Region”. You can generate a report for a custom region you have already created and saved, or create a new one. To pull up a previously saved custom region, select from the My Saved Custom Regions drop down menu. Draw Custom Region will allow you to draw a new custom region for the report.

To create a Custom Region from the Reports page, set the location to the general area where you wish to draw by typing in a zip code, state, city or select a predefine location from the tabs in the Set Location bar. Click GO. Choose how you want to build the custom region by; Draw on top of the map, Assemble predefine geographies, or as a Radius around an address. Follow the instructions for each type of custom region you want to create and click Generate Report when you are done.

Polygon Region – Premium subscribers have the ability to upload prebuilt custom regions called Polygons. To generate a Polygon report, premium subscribers should load their data from Add Sites and selected from the icon of the polygon and choose the option to generate a polygon report or a radius of a polygon. If you choose a radius report, the specified center will be the longitude and latitude of the centroid for the polygon.

Finally, once you have generated your report, you can save it to access at a later time or print a PDF copy to share. All saved and printed reports will be available in your My PolicyMap section.

Look for new upcoming report features like the option to quickly copy each section and paste into your work, the ability to choose what geography of data each section uses to aggregate, or the very dynamic report builder. Or if you have a suggestion or request on a feature, please contact us at pmap@policymap.com or call us at (866) 923-MAPS.

Did you know your My PolicyMap page has been updated to load a bit faster. Now when you open the My PolicyMap page, each category of saved items are collapsed and just need to have individually loaded.  All of your saved work is still there. All of the functions are still available; open a file, download a previously printed item, edit the file name, and even sharing custom regions.

To expend a category, just select the (+) sign.  This will load all the saved items for that category. Selecting the (–) sign will collapse the category again.

As stated, you have all the functionality that was previously available.  Including generating reports for custom regions on the fly or even sharing a custom region with another subscriber using the Share Custom Region feature.

Read our Quick Start Guide to learn the basics of PolicyMap and jump right into using the power of data.

If you wanted to know more about a feature or topic, send your request to info@policymap.com subject “Did you Know…”

Sincerely,
The PolicyMap Team

Did you know, building a custom region in PolicyMap gives subscribers the ability to create their own unique areas on the map, and then build reports for those areas. Subscribers have always had the ability to draw a custom region right on top of the map; these custom regions can cross predefined geographic boundaries like census tracts, zip codes, and counties.

Now users can draw a radius around an address or assemble a grouping of boundaries – like block groups, census tracts or zip codes – to create a custom region. To use these features, click the “Build Custom Region” in the bar along the bottom of the map and choose one of the three (3) types of custom regions: Drawn, Assembled, or Radius.

Draw Custom Region – This allows you to free draw a custom region right on top of the map. After selecting OK (read the instructions for details), your mouse pointer will appear as crosshairs. To begin drawing the boundaries of your desired region, click once on the map to create the corners of your custom region. The grey line that appears shows the boundary as you draw it. You can pan around the map by holding down the left mouse button while building a custom region or zoom in and out using the zoom bar on the left of the map. Close the custom region by clicking on the first point again. Once you close your custom region, enter a name and add an optional description in the dialogue box, then select Save. All saved custom regions will be available in your My PolicyMap. If you make a mistake while drawing your region and want to start over, simply select Disable Custom Region from the bar along the bottom of the map, and then re-select Build Custom Region to begin again.

You can clear your current custom region and start over, or Save when complete.

Custom Region by Radius – This allows you to create a radius boundary. You can enter a specific address as the center of the radius or click on the map to identify the center. After choosing Radius Custom Region and selecting OK (read the instructions for details), you can enter an address in the “Specify Center of Radius”, specify the size of your radius and click GO; OR click on the map to identify the center (you’ll see the latitude and longitude appear in the Specify Center box), specify the size of the radius, and click GO. Then, give your radius a name and description and click “Save”. If you make a mistake when either entering an address or clicking the map, select “Cancel” to clear the custom region and either enter a new address or click on the map again to specify the center. All saved custom regions will be available in your My PolicyMap.

• In Maps: You can display saved custom regions by choosing from the drop down menu on the bottom left of the map. Once selected, the map will zoom to that location, display the boundary of your custom region, and highlight it in the drop down menu. You can view multiple custom regions on the map at once by selecting multiple regions from the list. To remove a region from the map, simply click on it from the list to deselect.
• In Tables: You can add a custom region to a table by choosing from the drop down menu on the bottom left of the Tables page. Tables can give you aggregated values for some indicators for custom regions. If a value cannot be calculated for your custom region, the table will return a value of N/A.
• In Reports: You can generate a report for a custom region by entering the reports page, selecting the report you’d like to see and selecting a Saved Custom Region from the pull down list.

If you want to know more about a feature or topic, send your request to info@policymap.com subject “Did you Know…”

Sincerely,

The PolicyMap Team

Did you know you can print a map of just your target area shaded and have the surrounding area clear?  We call this feature "island printing."  To use island printing:

1. Search for your default location.  Your searched location will be the area the map will shade by. (i.e. searching for Chicago will only shade the city of Chicago when you choose "island printing.")
2. Create a map as normal with a data layer and  Add Sites.
3. When you are ready to print the map, choose "only shade selected region."

Map of only Chicago shaded

Subscribers can choose to have an island printed map of just their target area (or custom region) shaded.  Just load your custom region from the Maps page or from My PolicyMap, load the data layer and Add Sites to display on the map, and print using the "only shade selected region" option.

Map of only custom region shaded

Read our Quick Start Guide to learn the basics of PolicyMap and jump right into using the power of data. If you wanted to know more about a feature or topic, send your request to info@policymap.com subject “Did you Know…”

Sincerely,
The PolicyMap Team