National Historical Geographic Information System

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This research project will enhance and expand the IPUMS National Historical Geographic Information System (NHGIS) database. NHGIS is the nation's most comprehensive source for census data, geographic data, and metadata describing population characteristics of American regions, places, and neighborhoods from 1790 to the present. This project will provide new spatiotemporal data and tools for the analysis of spatial change. The enhanced database is needed for basic social research and policy analysis because models and descriptions of the past underlie both theories of past social change and projections into the future. The project outcomes will be important not only for academic research, but also for social science training, journalism, policy research at the state and local levels, and private sector research. The planned improvements will expand the impact of NHGIS by making it more powerful and accessible. Data access and product enhancements will facilitate a range of new research applications and data visualizations drawing directly from the massive NHGIS data collection. A geographically standardized time series will minimize researchers' need to create their own data using crosswalks, to decide which census concepts are compatible or consistent over time, or to pay for commercial solutions. This project will educate and train undergraduate and graduate students from underrepresented populations through the Minnesota Population Center's Summer Diversity Fellowship Program. NHGIS provides a unique laboratory for the spatial analysis of economic and social processes and offers the empirical foundation needed for developing and testing models of society.Over the next five years, this project will implement four major improvements to the NHGIS infrastructure: (1) Spatiotemporal data integration and assessment. Census unit boundaries frequently change between censuses, making it difficult to analyze population changes over time and space. The project team will extend NHGIS geographically standardized time series to cover more years and subjects using optimized interpolation models, produce robust margins of errors for standardized estimates, and thoroughly assess standardized data accuracy. (2) Geocoding of restricted-access census microdata for the 1990 and 2000 censuses. To assess geographically standardized time series, the project team will produce high-quality benchmark data by geocoding individual-level 1990 and 2000 census responses and assigning them to 2010 census units. They also will disseminate the geocoded coordinates to approved researchers through the Federal Statistical Research Data Centers. (3) Data access and product enhancements. The project team will produce a robust public Application Programming Interface (API) and R package to deliver data programmatically. They also will expand the NHGIS collection of GIS files to include cartographically generalized boundaries, water and road data, and population center points. (4) User support, outreach, and dissemination. The project will sustain and expand NHGIS education and outreach efforts, offering individual user support and in-person workshops and creating data visualizations that highlight unique or underutilized NHGIS data on subjects of interest to a broad audience.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.