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The Greater Boston Data Portal
These websites contain comprehensive data and research about the City of Boston, Metro Boston, or Massachusetts. For data by sector, see Links and Resources.
COMING in 2006: The Metropolitan Boston Regional Data Repository, a wealth of local and regional data and tools for mapping and analysis—a joint project of the Metropolitan Area Planning Council and the Boston Indicators Project. |
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The Boston
Indicators Project
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The award-winning Boston Indicators Project website is coordinated by the Boston Foundation in partnership with the City of Boston/BRA and the Metropolitan Area Planning Council. Biennial reports, with regular posts of new research, track change and progress in ten sectors affecting Boston and the region: Civic Health, Cultural Life and the Arts, Economy, Education, Environment, Housing, Public Health, Public Safety, Technology, and Transportation, with sector overviews, goals and measures, graphs, tables, and maps. The charts and graphs can be enlarged, and the underlying data viewed and downloaded. See also Understanding Boston for Boston Foundation-sponsored research on key issues facing the city and region. |
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The Boston Redevelopment Authority (BRA) is the City of Boston's planning and development agency. Complementing these functions, the researchers and analysts in its Research Division regularly compile and analyze data and issue reports on a range of issues that affect Boston and its neighborhoods. The research and publications section of the BRA’s website contains links to a wealth of these reports, with demographic, economic, housing, land use, and industry data from the US Census and many other sources. The site also contains in-depth profiles on each of Boston’s neighborhoods. The BRA’s Boston Atlas is a powerful and dynamic 3-D mapping tool with a wealth of historical and parcel-based information about Boston. |
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The Metropolitan Area Planning Council (MAPC) serves 101 cities and towns in Eastern Massachusetts. Its staff provides analytical, planning and mapping services, and maintains a Metro Data Center with statistical profiles of its constituent cities and towns and US Census data as well as population, household and employment forecasts. MAPC's website also has links to other data sources, and to MAPC's MetroFuture Initiative, which offers dynamic online tools to inform and engage residents of Greater Boston in creating a shared regional plan for the next 10 years. |
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The Center for Urban and Regional Policy (CURP) at Northeastern University offers a Visual Data section on its website that contains tables, charts, graphs, maps, photographs, and renderings. CURP also produced the Boston Renaissance Resource Kit (BRRK) with data from the Greater Boston Social Survey -- 400 pieces of information about 1,800 households -- and from the US Census for all 351 cities and towns in Massachusetts from 1950 through 2000. To use the user-friendly and dynamic BRRK, download, unzip, and install it on your computer. |
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Major research reports, policy briefs, and events concerning the governance of Greater Boston. Coming soon: the Greater Boston Database of data pertaining to the Greater Boston area. |
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The Federal Reserve Bank of Boston website offers a wealth of information about the Greater Boston and the New England region. New England Economic Indicators is a monthly publication (available in pdf) presenting economic data and summary articles about the six New England states and their large metro areas. The website includes the Indicators database, a comprehensive and expanded collection of data previously published in Indicators. In 2005 the Boston Federal Reserve Bank launched the New England Public Policy Center, which coordinates public policy research and events concerning issues that affect the region such as state and local public finance, economic development, housing and land use, health care, and regional economic conditions. |
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The Massachusetts Office of Geographic and Environmental Information (MassGIS) provides comprehensive data for download and a web-based mapping application, OLIVER, which requires installation of Java Web Start: instructions and download are available here. |
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MassINC, the Massachusetts Institute for a New Commonwealth, is a non-partisan, evidence-based organization whose mission is to develop a public agenda for Massachusetts that promotes the growth and vitality of the middle class. Its website contains recent and archived studies conducted by MassINC as well as articles from its Commonwealth Magazine and MassFACTS, a series of statistics about Massachusetts, grouped by topic. |
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The Boston Region office of the Census Bureau hosts workshops on using Census resources, including the American FactFinder, a tool on the Census website that allows you to create custom data tables for a variety of geographies, to download data, and to create maps. More advanced users can download Census and CDC microdata using the free Data Ferrett software. |
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Links to data and research by sector -->
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CIVIC HEALTH, CULTURAL LIFE AND THE ARTS, ECONOMY, EDUCATION, ENVIRONMENT, HOUSING, PUBLIC HEALTH, PUBLIC SAFETY, TECHNOLOGY, and TRANSPORTATION |
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