Local data can help tell powerful, geographically-specific stories—but only if the data are easy to explore and understand. The City Health Dashboard transforms complex health data into accessible, interactive visualizations that make it easier for users to identify patterns, compare cities, and uncover insights. In this blog, we – two Dashboard data analysts – walk you through visualizations across the website.

1. City Overview

We’ll begin on the Dashboard's home page. Choose a city, then navigate to the City Overview page by selecting “View all metrics for [city name]”. Here you’ll see estimates for over 45 health-related metrics, parsed to that city’s specific boundaries. One visualization you'll encounter on this page - and throughout the Dashboard - is a scale bar.

The scale bar shows where a city's estimate falls within the overall range of values, indicated by a gold bar. Across the Dashboard, lighter shades indicate better outcomes, while darker shades indicate worse outcomes, and a blue circled check mark indicates where on the scale bar the better outcome lies. If a city’s estimate is better than the Dashboard average, there will be a green check mark above the gold bar. The average value for all Dashboard cities is always represented as a blue triangle.

Additional details: You can also change the minimum and maximum values on the scale bar at the top of the page. By default, the scale bar reflects the city’s minimum and maximum values.

• “City Values”: Uses min/max census tract values within the selected city

• “All Dashboard City Values”: Uses min/max city values across all cities on the Dashboard

By scrolling through the City Overview, you can get a quick sense of how your city is doing on each metric. Once you select a metric, you’ll find a “sensemaking statement” below the scale bar that provides a written interpretation of the metric estimate, a description of the metric, and its data source. On the right, you’ll see a map, which uses the same color gradients as the scale bar. We’ll primarily use Children in Poverty as an example throughout this walkthrough.

Note: Data may not be available for certain metrics, certain cities, or certain years.

2. Metric Detail

As you click on the map or the tab at the top of the page, you'll be taken to the Metric Detail page. Here you can view a larger, interactive version of the map. Note: Some capabilities may not be available for certain metrics.

As you explore the map, you may notice color variations among different census tracts – remember, lighter colors reflect better outcomes. To find the estimate for a particular census tract, click on that census tract and a pop-up display will show the census tract number, ZIP Code, and the metric estimate for that tract.

You can also click "ADD TRACT TO CUSTOMIZED AREA" to build your own custom area by selecting multiple census tracts. Each tract you add appears as a card in the Customized Area panel on the right, and the Weighted Average for Custom Area automatically generates for the selected tracts. To remove a tract, simply click "REMOVE" on its card.

Before moving on, let's explore one more unique feature (available for 364 cities). In the lower-left corner of the map, click the Redlining Map icon to display a historical redlining overlay. These maps, created by the U.S. Home Owners' Loan Corporation in the 1930s, depict mortgage lending risk grades assigned to neighborhoods by the U.S. federal government based on numerous factors including neighborhood racial and economic composition. You can learn more about this feature in our blog here.

That wraps up our overview of the interactive map features on the Metric Detail page!

Click "Next: View Demographic Detail" in the bottom-right corner of the page to continue the tour.

3. Demographic Detail

The Dashboard provides demographic breakdowns whenever possible. Demographics provide information about the people who live in a city, such as their age, race and ethnicity, sex, and other characteristics. For many metrics, you can view results by race/ethnicity, sex, or age. For Children in Poverty, race and ethnicity breakdowns are available. The scale bar below shows the metric value for Hispanic demographic group.

Note: Demographic breakdowns may not be available for certain metrics.

In this example, the number above the gold bar represents the percentage of your city’s Hispanic child population experiencing poverty, while the value under the triangle represents the average percentage of the Hispanic population experiencing Children in Poverty across all Dashboard cities. Comparing these values on the scale bar helps you see how your city's Hispanic population compares with the same demographic group in other Dashboard cities. The information on the left side of the scale bar provides additional context.

The value under "Hispanic" indicates the percentage of your city’s total population that self-identifies as Hispanic. This helps you understand the potential impact of the metric on your community. A demographic group may have a metric value that is either better or worse than the Dashboard average, while also representing either a relatively large or small share of the city's population.

4. Compare Cities

Next, click on “COMPARE CITIES” to see how your city compares to others on the Dashboard. The filtering tool “Filter to Find Comparison Cities” allows you to select city comparators including location, population size, city demographics, and more. The cities’ scale bars will populate below, allowing for easy comparison.

Additional details: The table below the scale bars provides demographic breakdowns. The number in parentheses next to each estimate is the 90% confidence interval, indicating the range of uncertainty around the estimate. For more information on confidence intervals, click here.

5. Compare Metrics

Finally, you can scroll down and click on “VIEW: COMPARE METRICS” to compare estimates for two metrics within the same city.

You can use the “METRIC COMPARISON MAP” to gain a better understanding of the geographic patterns of two metrics at the same time and explore how they might relate to each other. The map includes the standard scale bar for your selected metric and an additional red gradient scale bar (comprised of round dots) for the comparison metric. Like on the blue scale bar you’re used to, lighter colored dots represent more desirable outcomes while darker dots represent less desirable outcomes. Let’s select Uninsured as our comparison metric. Looking at the map, you can see that in many places lighter colored census dots are in lighter colored census tracts, and darker colored tracts contain darker colored dots. This gives you an immediate sense of the geographic pattern for both metrics.

Additional details: You can scroll down to “SCATTERPLOT VIEW” to examine the relationship between two metrics across census tracts. Each point represents a census tract, with values for one metric on the horizontal axis and the comparison metric on the vertical axis.

Rather than focusing on individual points, you’ll observe the overall pattern to see whether higher values for one tend to occur alongside higher or lower values for the other. Be mindful that outliers may make a relationship appear stronger or weaker, but an association does not mean causation.

Finally, scroll down further to find the “COMPARISON BY DEMOGRAPHIC GROUPS” bar charts, which shows how outcomes vary across racial/ethnic or sex groups within your city (where data are available). The gold bars represent the selected city, while the dark blue bars represent the Dashboard city average. This feature can help you identify where additional attention or resources may be needed, and whether disparities are distributed similarly across the two metrics. Note: Demographic breakdowns may not be available for certain metrics.

Congratulations! You've completed the tour of the City Health Dashboard’s data visualization tools. We hope this guide helps you feel more confident navigating the Dashboard and interpreting the data we provide.

Please reach out to [email protected] with any questions.