Overview
Over the past few years, NCSG has been actively engaged in projects related to issues of neighborhood opportunity. That is, the ways in which neighborhoods help to shape the access that individuals and communities have to various kinds of educational, employment, health or other opportunities that can improve their long-term prospects. We have been particularly concerned with how “opportunity mapping” can be used to document and alleviate the barriers that disadvantaged communities face to accessing opportunities within their neighborhoods and around their metropolitan regions. Through a better understanding of the spatial structure of opportunity and how communities understand and navigate this structure, our research hopes to advance community development efforts as well as regional plans and policies designed to address such disparities.
In related projects, we have been involved in creating and assessing the effectiveness of opportunity and equity maps as well as plans, policies, and community-based development efforts that have emerged from them at the regional, state, and national level. We have also worked with communities as part of our efforts to show how community engagement in opportunity mapping and data collection processes can improve plans and policies to provide low-income communities’ greater access to opportunity.
Sponsors
- Enterprise Community Partners
- Maryland Department of Housing and Community Development
- Prince George’s County Department of Housing and Community Development
Partners
Resources
- Reclassification of Sustainable Neighborhoods: An Opportunity Indicator Analysis in Baltimore Metropolitan Area
- Mapping Opportunity: A Critical Assessment
- Baltimore Regional Plan for Sustainable Development
- Measures of Opportunity in the Baltimore Metropolitan Region
- Strong Communities, Strong Region – The Baltimore Regional Housing Plan & Fair Housing Equity Assessment
- Towards an Equitable Region: Lessons from Baltimore’s Sustainable Communities Initiative Grant
- Defining ‘Opportunity’ in Baltimore
- The Cartography of Opportunity: Spatial Data Science for Equitable Urban Policy
- Identifying and Using Key Indicators to Determine Neighborhood Types in Different Regions
- Engaging Communities around Opportunity though Story Mapping
- Story Mapping in Action: Engaging an Immigrant Community in Planning for a New Light Rail
- Community Engagement Toolkit
- Opportunity for Whom? The Diverse Definitions of Neighborhood Opportunity in Baltimore
- Prince George’s County Comprehensive Housing Strategy
- Opportunity Mapping and Equity Mapping: Case Studies of 5 U.S. Cities
Contacts
Chao Liu