The Outlines and Extents of Segregation

Ron Wilson
U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development
University of Maryland, Baltimore County

Graphic Detail
Geographic Information Systems (GIS) organize and clarify the patterns of human activities on the Earth’s surface and their interaction with each other. GIS data, in the form of maps, can quickly and powerfully convey relationships to policymakers and the public. This department of Cityscape includes maps that convey important housing or community development policy issues or solutions. If you have made such a map and are willing to share it in a future issue of Cityscape, please contact rwilson@umbc.edu.

Maps of segregation often highlight concentration patterns of racial or ethnic groups. Patterns at the edges of the segregated areas are not typically shown or discussed in many of these maps. The lack of attention to the edges—transition areas—may be because it is assumed that segregated areas change abruptly from one racial group to another. Exhibit 1, however, as an example, reveals patterns of racial integration that form at the edges and outline the boundaries of the segregated areas in Chicago.