CPD Beat to Census Block Crosswalk

Chicago Census Block Crosswalks Geographic crosswalks mapping 2020 Census block geography to Chicago Police Department (CPD) beats, police districts, and community areas, enabling spatial interpolation of census data to administrative units. Overview This dataset provides area-weighted crosswalk tables that allow researchers to: Aggregate Census block-level data to CPD police beats Interpolate demographic and socioeconomic variables across geographic boundaries Account for partial overlaps between census and police geographies The crosswalk was generated using areal interpolation methods applied to official boundary shapefiles from the City of Chicago and U.S. Census Bureau. Funding Acknowledgment This research was supported by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) under grant R01MD015064. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health. Data Description Crosswalk Files File Description Size data/ChiBlocks2020-PoliceBeats_full_crosswalk.csv Blocks → 274 Police Beats (long format) ~3.4 MB data/ChiBlocks2020-PoliceBeats_crosswalk.csv Blocks → Police Beats (wide matrix) ~42 MB data/ChiBlocks2020-PoliceDistricts_full_crosswalk.csv Blocks → 22 Police Districts (long format) ~2.6 MB data/ChiBlocks2020-PoliceDistricts_crosswalk.csv Blocks → Police Districts (wide matrix) ~4.0 MB data/ChiBlocks2020-CommunityAreas_full_crosswalk.csv Blocks → 77 Community Areas (long format) ~3.2 MB data/ChiBlocks2020-CommunityAreas_crosswalk.csv Blocks → Community Areas (wide matrix) ~12.5 MB data/ChiBlocks2020_areas.csv Block areas in square meters ~1.3 MB Shapefiles Folder Description Size geo/ChiBlocks2020/ 2020 Census Blocks clipped to Chicago ~61 MB geo/PoliceBeats/ CPD Police Beat boundaries ~1.3 MB geo/PoliceDistricts/ CPD Police District boundaries ~436 KB geo/CommunityAreas/ Chicago Community Area boundaries ~876 KB Geographic Coverage Source geography: 2020 Census Blocks (TIGER/Line) clipped to Chicago city boundaries Target geographies: CPD Police Beats, Police Districts, and Community Areas Coordinate Reference System: EPSG:6454 (NAD83(2011) / Illinois East) Extent: City of Chicago municipal boundaries See docs/data_dictionary.md for detailed column descriptions. Replication Requirements conda env create -f environment.yml conda activate cpd-census-crosswalk Notebooks The notebooks/ directory contains Jupyter notebooks documenting the crosswalk generation process: prepare_geos.ipynb - Prepares and standardizes input shapefiles census_to_beat_interpolation.ipynb - Demonstrates interpolation workflow validate_interpolation.ipynb - Validates results against CMAP reference data Python Modules spatial_interpolation.py - Core interpolation function spatial_operations.py - Crosswalk generation and spatial utilities Usage Example import pandas as pd from spatial_interpolation import interpolate # Load your census block data census_data = pd.read_csv("your_block_data.csv") # Interpolate population (extensive variable) to police beats variables = {"population": "extensive"} beat_data = interpolate( census_data, variables, source_geo="ChiBlocks2020", target_geo="PoliceBeats" ) Citation If you use this dataset, please cite: Graziul, Christopher, Keller, Drew, & Spencer, Margaret Beale. (2024). CPD Beat to Census Block Crosswalk [Data set]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.18111458 BibTeX: @dataset{cpd_census_crosswalk_2024, author = {Graziul, Christopher and Keller, Drew and Spencer, Margaret Beale}, title = {{CPD Beat to Census Block Crosswalk}}, year = {2024}, publisher = {Zenodo}, doi = {10.5281/zenodo.18111458}, url = {https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.18111458} } License This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0). See LICENSE for full terms. You are free to: Share - copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format Adapt - remix, transform, and build upon the material Under the following terms: Attribution - You must give appropriate credit and indicate if changes were made NonCommercial - You may not use the material for commercial purposes Data Sources Census Blocks: U.S. Census Bureau, TIGER/Line Shapefiles, 2020 Police Beats: City of Chicago Data Portal, Boundaries - Police Beats (current) Police Districts: City of Chicago Data Portal, Boundaries - Police Districts (current) Community Areas: City of Chicago Data Portal, Boundaries - Community Areas (current) City Boundary: City of Chicago Data Portal, Boundaries - City Contact Christopher Michael Graziul - [e-mail] Version History v1.0.0 (2024): Initial release