The Context: Leveraging the power of data to answer questions that solve specific problems
Unlike many of the other industries we work with, the public sector has incredible breadth and depth that can’t really be encapsulated in a one-size-fits-all way. So much of the data-driven work happening daily in non-profit organizations, academic institutions, and government agencies is specifically focused on answering highly specific questions that aim to address issues occurring within the public sphere. The ultimate goal: Informing the development of new policies that can positively impact people’s lives at the national, state, and local levels.
Therefore, it should come as no surprise that the need for high-quality data within the public sector really came to a fever pitch during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. Many researchers and analysts within various public sector organizations were frantically trying to wrap their heads around how the pandemic would impact things like access to healthcare services, long-term mental health, shifts in human behavior (i.e. how daily mobility changed), compliance with stay-at-home orders, the resilience of the economy, evolving purchase behaviors, school closures, and the list goes on.
At a time when the world felt like it got turned upside down, researchers within the public sector turned to location-based data to understand not only what was happening in real-time but also to identify ways of making the best out of a challenging and unprecedented situation. In many ways, the pandemic shed new light on the importance of comprehensive places data as the key to driving immediately actionable insights.
The Problem: How to determine the accessibility and walkability of urban areas
One of the biggest questions that came up soon after the world came to a screeching halt was around the overall accessibility of urban areas. More specifically, one public sector organization we’ve worked with wanted to get a deeper understanding of which urban areas in the United States could provide people with essentially everything they needed to survive—all within a walking distance of their homes. This includes things like hospitals and clinics, pharmacies, grocery stores, banks, public transportation, and other essential services.
Doing this analysis would, therefore, make it possible for them to pinpoint the urban areas that were inherently less walkable and then use that knowledge to inform new policies or serve as a catalyst for infrastructure development aiming to put more services within easy reach.
One of the key areas of focus for this analysis centered on grocery stores. Not only did this public sector organization want to understand if or how many grocery stores were within a walkable distance for people living in these urban areas but also what kinds of grocery store options existed. For example, was there a big supermarket nearby to fulfill a community’s nutritional needs or only small bodegas or mini-marts with limited food options?
Of course, a big part of this research was aimed at identifying so-called “food deserts,” or areas where healthy food options are severely limited, as that makes it a lot easier to build business cases for investing in infrastructure to fill those gaps. But similarly, this research can also shine a spotlight on urban areas that are more prone to public health crises, like obesity for example, and, as a result, have greater potential to place unnecessary stress on local health services.
So, while walkability may have been the primary goal of this analysis, solving the broader accessibility issue can have a cascade effect on other issues pertaining to public health.