MassGIS had received quarterly updates of these data as part of its license for the HERE (Navteq) core map release (streets and related data); however, that license has expired. These ZIP Code boundaries are aligned to the street centerlines of the Q2 2018 HERE product (with a release date of April 1, 2018) and use a then-recent USPS source file.In March 2024, MassGIS modified the boundaries for all ZIP Code areas in Boston based on the U.S. Postal Service's ZIP Code Look Up by Address website. MassGIS also added polygons for ZIP Codes 02199 and 02203.Five-digit ZIP Codes were developed by the USPS and first introduced in 1963 for efficient mail delivery (the term ZIP stands for Zone Improvement Plan) but are difficult to map with complete certainty. In most cases, addresses in close proximity to each other are grouped in the same ZIP Code, which gives the appearance that ZIP Codes are defined by a clear geographic boundary. However, even when ZIP Codes appear to be geographically grouped, a clear ZIP Code boundary cannot always be drawn because ZIP Codes are only assigned to a point of delivery and not the spaces between delivery points. In areas without a regular postal route or no mail delivery, ZIP Codes may not be defined or have unclear boundaries.The USPS does not maintain an official ZIP Code map. The Census Bureau and many other commercial services will interpolate the data to create polygons to represent the approximate area covered by a ZIP code, but none of these maps are official or entirely accurate. Please see this good discussion of the issues of mapping ZIP Codes.See full metadata.Map service also available.

Boston Neighborhood Boundaries represent a combination of zoning neighborhood boundaries, zip code boundaries and 2010 census tract boundaries. These boundaries are used in the broad sense for visualization purposes, research analysis and planning studies. However these boundaries are not official neighborhood boundaries for the City of Boston. The BPDA is not responsible for any districts or boundaries within the City of Boston except for the districts we use for planning purposes.

Summary

The State of Early Education and Care in Boston: Supply, Demand, Affordability, and Quality, is the first in what is planned as a recurrent landscape survey of early childhood, preschool and childcare programs in every neighborhood of Boston. It focuses on potential supply, demand and gaps in child-care seats (availability, quality and affordability). This report’s estimates set a baseline understanding to help focus and track investments and policy changes for early childhood in the city.

This publication is a culmination of efforts by a diverse data committee representing providers, parents, funding agencies, policymakers, advocates, and researchers. The report includes data from several sources, such as American Community Survey, Massachusetts Department of Early Education and Care, Massachusetts Department of Elementary & Secondary Education, Boston Public Health Commission, City of Boston, among others. For detailed information on methodology, findings and recommendations, please access the full report here

The first dataset contains all Census data used in the publication. Data is presented by neighborhoods:

• Population 0 – 5 years;
• Population 0 – 2 years;
• Population 3 – 5 years;
• Race/ethnicity for children 0 – 4 years (White, non-Hispanic; Black; Asian; Hispanic/Latinx);
• Family type (married couples, female householder, male householder);
• Poverty status;
• Family median income in the past 12 months;
• Average cost of care as a percentage of median family income (infant, preschool);
• Share of families that cannot afford care (infant, preschool)

The Boston Planning & Development Agency Research Division analyzed 2013-2017 American Community Survey data to estimate numbers by ZIP-Code. The Boston Opportunity Agenda combined that data by the approximate neighborhoods and estimated cost of care and affordability.

Additional notes:

• Record Type: Each record represents a ZIP-Code defined neighborhood. See list below for detailed information on Boston ZIP-Codes used to create each one of the 15 neighborhoods.
• Data Quality: Numbers presented here came from 2013-2017 American Community Survey data. Therefore, these are ESTIMATES and have margin of errors. The smaller the geographical unit, the greater the margin of error. The Boston Planning & Development Agency analyzed the data to estimate numbers by ZIP-Code.
• Race/Ethnicity: Non-White Hispanics may be double counted due to data limitations.
• Cost of Care: The average cost of care as a percentage of median family income was computed assuming the annual average cost of infant care was $19,877 and the average cost of preschool care was $ 13,771 (Childcare Aware of America, 2019). For each neighborhood we estimated the impact of child care (infant and preschool) on its median annual family income.
• Affordability: The Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) sets a standard regarding the affordability of child care, where the annual cost of child care should not exceed 10 percent of household annual income. Using this 10% threshold, we estimated that to afford market rate infant care, a family’s annual income would have to be at least $198,770. The census income bracket closest to this income was a family income of $150,000– 199,999. To afford preschool care, a family's annual income should be at least $137,710. Thus, the census income bracket that encompass this income is $125,000 - 149,999. For both infant and preschool care, we underestimated the number of families that can afford care.

This data set contains a series of administrative geographies utilized by the City of Boston, including: traditional neighborhoods defined by the Boston Planning and Development Agency (BPDA Neighborhood Statistical Areas, BPDA Planning Districts); election board regions (City Council Districts, Election Precincts, Election Wards); and districts for City operations (Fire Districts, ISD Neighborhoods, Police Districts, Public Works Districts, and ZIP Codes). For each we include a shape file with unique identifiers. These geographic files were obtained from the City of Boston Department of Innovation and Technology’s Analyze Boston data hub site: https://data.boston.gov/. Information pertaining to these files can be found in the most recent documentation for the "Geographical Infrastructure for the City of Boston." Note: These geographies are the most recent updated versions at the time of the release of the most recent Geographical Infrastructure for the City of Boston.

These datasets contain summarizing clusters and dimensions of place-based social determinant of health measures for the United States from AHRQ's Social Determinants of Health Database (https://www.ahrq.gov/sdoh/data-analytics/sdoh-data.html), along with the underlying SDOH data. Summary clusters and dimensions are available for both counties and Zip codes. The measures are taken from the 2019 and 2018 AHRQ SDOH datasets. Underlying SDOH measures are in the domains of social context, economic context, education, physical infrastructure, and healthcare context. The summary dimensions and cluster memberships for counties and Zip codes were generated using principal components analysis and hierarchical cluster analysis techniques to provide simple high-level representations of the SDOH context for counties and Zip codes.

Comprehensive demographic and housing statistics for ZIP code 03070 in New Boston, New Hampshire.

This dataset contains daily aggregated measurements of daily PM2.5 from ambient wildfire smoke in the contiguous United States, spanning from 2006 to 2016. The data is sourced from a study by Childs et al. (2022), titled "Daily Local-Level Estimates of Ambient Wildfire Smoke PM2.5 for the Contiguous US" published in Environmental Science & Technology. To compute the standardized weight across different zip codes, we computed the weight calculation on a 10km grids. To compute the weight, we obtain area-weights that add up to 1 in each polygon of zipcodes. This enabled us to calculate the smoke values per zipcode for the aforementioned period. Those interested in replicating our data processing pipeline can access it at https://github.com/NSAPH-Data-Processing/smoke_aggregation.

Average demographics across Boston ZIP code tabulation areas (ZCTAs) (N = 25), 2020–2022.

Boston Neighborhood Boundaries represent a combination of zoning neighborhood boundaries, zip code boundaries and 2010 census tract boundaries. These boundaries are used in the broad sense for visualization purposes, research analysis and planning studies. However these boundaries are not official neighborhood boundaries for the City of Boston. The BPDA is not responsible for any districts or boundaries within the City of Boston except for the districts we use for planning purposes.

This is one of over 400 major media market consumer surveys which have been gifted to Washington State University (WSU) by Leigh Stowell & Company, Inc. of Seattle, Washington, USA. This is a market research firm which specializes in providing newspapers, television affiliates and cable operators with market segmentation research pertinent to consumer purchasing patterns and the effective marketing of goods and services to program audiences. The data in the Stowell Archive were collected via random digit dialing and computer-aided telephone interviews (CATI). Most of the surveys focus on the marketing needs of mass media clients and contain demographics, psychographics, media exposure information, and purchasing behavior data about consumers in major metropolitan areas of the United States and Canada starting in 1989. The sample sizes of the surveys range from 500 to 3,000 respondents, averaging 1,000 observations per study. Data are available at the respondent level, and all observations are keyed to zip code or other geographic identifiers. Additional surveys are anticipated, with over twenty new media marke t studies being donated annually. The University's relationship with Leigh Stowell & Company, Inc. was cultivated by Dr. Nicholas Lovrich, Director of WSU's Division of Governmental Studies and Services (DGSS) and by Dr. John Pierce, former Dean of the WSU College of Liberal Arts over the course of a decade. DGSS collaborated with WSU Libraries Digital Services to process the gifted data files into this digital archive which features powerful search and download capabilities. Further refinement of the archive in accordance with the Data Documentation Initiative is progressing with support from the Office of the Provost, the College of Liberal Arts and the WSU Libraries. It is important to note that the year indicated by the study's title is the year that the original survey was published, and is not necessarily the year in which the interviews were conducted. Refer to the metadata field "Dates of Collection" to di scern the interview dates of each specific survey. Refer also to date fields within the data file itself.

Find data on drinking water quality in Massachusetts. This dataset shows drinking water exceedances for lead by Community Water System and year of exceedance in Massachusetts.