Mapping Comfort in Los Angeles Sorin MATEI Project Goals Project Description Research Design Map Aggregation Types of Maps Spatial Modeling Future Plans Related Documents

NextPrevious 2 Mapping Component Goals To map comfort and connectedness in Los Angeles To digitize and rasterize hand drawn maps of Los Angeles Statistical analysis of communication factors contributing to sense of comfort in Los Angeles

NextPrevious 3 Multi-Method Research Design Data collected for the METAMORPHOSIS project Forty-Minute Telephone Interview (N = 250 households per area, 1488 completed) Focus Groups (9 completed) Community Organization Interviews Community Leader Interviews

NextPrevious 4 Telephone Interviews Major Variables Include: –Cohesion and Integration –Low and High-Tech Modes of Communication –Travel and Inter-Area Contact Patterns –Subjective and Objective Sense of Belonging –Regional Community Connections –Community Capital

NextPrevious 5 Map collection 58 people from 4 areas colored in during focus groups black and white maps of LA: –Crenshaw, Westside, South Pasadena, East Los Angeles Collection in progress: –Koreatown, Pico-Union, Alhambra –data collected, not yet digitized The maps are individually redrawn as vector layers in ArcView GIS

NextPrevious 6 Respondent recruiting areas

NextPrevious 7 Drawing the maps Respondents recruited focus groups were asked to color in : RED - uncomfortable areas ORANGE - somewhat comfortable areas GREEN - comfortable areas BLUE - unknown areas Each color is assigned a numeric value in the attribute table: Red = -1 Blue = 0 Orange = 1 Green = 2

NextPrevious 8 Sample map in vector format

NextPrevious 9 Sample map in grid format The map is divided into 281 columns and 238 rows (66878 cells). Each cell is located on an X-Y coordinate system and has a unique value.

NextPrevious 10 Map aggregation Grid maps allow mathematical manipulation Cells can be added, averaged, etc. across maps Area maps are obtained by averaging Cell values can be grouped by standard deviation

NextPrevious 11 Map legend and chart Colors represent deviation from the mean Above the mean (comfortable) = green Below the mean (uncomfortable) = red Each shade = 1/4 standard deviation Chart shows number of cells per shade

NextPrevious 12 Types of maps produced Area maps –average of maps drawn by respondents from the same area Inter-area maps –average maps of subsets of areas White ethnicity maps (Westside and South Pasadena) White and African American maps White and Latino maps –capture interethnic dynamics in the area Los Angeles Composite Map

NextPrevious 13 Average map: Westside respondents Note South Central high discomfort area

NextPrevious 14 South Central discomfort area becomes larger compared to the Westside map but diminishes in intensity Average map: S. Pass respondents

NextPrevious 15 White respondents feel uncomfortable both in South Central and East LA Average map: White respondents

NextPrevious 16 South Central discomfort area stays red but diminishes in intensity and moves East of Harbor Freeway Average map: East LA respondents

NextPrevious 17 South Central discomfort area vanishes although respondents do not live in SC per se Average map: Crenshaw respondents

NextPrevious 18 When adding African American maps to White maps, SC discomfort area diminishes, but East LA stays uncomfortable White and Black respondents map

NextPrevious 19 White and Latino respondents map The map strikingly resembles the one drawn by White respondents. Latinos less likely to know the city (especially women).

NextPrevious 20 Grand total map (all areas) White structure of the map dominates. East Los Angeles and South Central are considered uncomfortable

NextPrevious 21 Preliminary conclusions North-West / South East division of the city Compton - Watts most uncomfortable Westside most comfortable area Glendale also comfortable San Fernando Valley mixed

NextPrevious 22 Spatial modelling Spatial Correlations –LA Composite map and crime maps –Issues of control Each respondent will have red/green ratio entered in the telephone survey dataset Predict degree of comfort by using media connectedness

NextPrevious 23 Future plans Collecting supplementary data –mail out with blank maps and markers –increase no. of maps per area Survey datasets –point maps - area you frequently go or avoid –interpolation (kringing) –interarea connectedness (have you been to…)

NextPrevious 24 Related Documents Click for Write-up Submit Questions