Use and interpret Daytime Population data
Population expansions and contractions between day and night and how it impacts the daytime workforce.
Population expansions and contractions between day and night and how it impacts the daytime workforce.
Esri's Data Development team produces demographic data (known as Updated Demographics) for the United States using a variety of sources to update small areas, beginning with the latest U.S. Census base along with a mixture of other private sources to capture demographic change. Alongside Updated Demographics, Esri provides U.S. Census Bureau and American Community Survey (ACS) demographics as a point of reference for understanding growth in an area and to provide additional community details.
Data tutorials educate both the novice and the expert analyst to learn more about a topic to properly incorporate Esri Demographics that are accessible within various products. In this tutorial, you will learn about the following:
First, you'll learn how Esri defines these variables and why they may be important in your work.
Daytime Population is an estimate of the population of both residents and workers during daytime hours and includes a sum of the total (residents and workers combined). An important distinction between Daytime Population and most other Esri Updated Demographics variables is that Updated Demographics typically represents data based on where people reside. Daytime Population depicts how an area's demographic composition can change during the day.
Next, you'll explore how the data is measured and how the terms residents and workers are used to define Daytime Population.
This illustration shows the relationship between the three variables in this data topic.
While there is no way to identify specific workday hours, Esri's data source defines workday activities as occurring Monday through Friday between 9a.m. and 5p.m.
Next, let's learn the differences between Daytime residents data and Daytime workers data.
Daytime residents are defined as the total number of persons who reside in the area and are present during normal business hours. This includes the civilian employed, those not in the labor force, and unemployed resident types, as shown in the image.
Daytime workers is defined as the total number of persons who are working in the area and present during normal business hours. This includes the armed forces, commuters, and workers who live and work in the same area as shown in the image.
Depending upon where you live, the vibrancy of your neighborhood, town, or city can look markedly different during the day. Lively city centers can contain substantially more people during the workday than at night. Other areas that are primarily residential, like "commuter towns", will depict larger outflows of people during the day.
Recognizing significant population flows due to the workday commute can be an important factor for many public and private entities. This image shows a sample use cases, such as commercial real estate, developers, urban planners, emergency service planners, tourism, and employment economic planners.
One of the best ways to begin an analysis is to map the data. The following map demonstrates using Daytime Population for the Greater Boston-Cambridge-Newton, Massachusetts-New Hampshire metropolitan area.
This map image was created using ArcGIS Online to understand how population changes throughout the day.
Census tracts where Daytime residents outnumber Daytime workers are shown using orange circles; tracts where Daytime workers mostly outnumber Daytime residents are highlighted with blue circles.
More than 5 million people call the Greater Boston metro home.
But its daytime population increases by 157,000 to 5.17 million persons during the workday (a total of 2.3 million Daytime residents and 2.8 million Daytime workers) - which is about a 3 percent increase during the day.
In the example above, thematically mapping Daytime Population data can highlight distinct day and night profiles and add clarity when segments of the day are a significant consideration in an analysis. If you are a business owner, counts of residents alone are less meaningful if you want to gauge how crowded or busy a place is during the times when your business is open. It's important to remember that populated areas can be completely residential, commercial, or some combination of each. With the Boston metro example, the presence of airports, universities, hospitals, federal buildings, and other facilities all contribute significantly to the area's daytime workforce.
Daytime Population is modelled with an emphasis on workplace commuting flows. Residential or nighttime employed estimates are spatially distributed to represent the likely locations of these populations during the day. The model does not account for population shifts due to transient movements or school attendance locations. For example, Daytime Population estimates do not account for persons entering a trade area to shop, dine, attend primary or secondary school, or students commuting to a college campus. Students are included in the Daytime residents variable, but they are included in the geographic area of where they live, not necessarily where they attend school. Only students accounted for in group quarters dormitory population counts from the decennial census will cover that share of the student body who live and attend school within the same location and are included in the Daytime residents estimate.
As with any analysis, using multiple data points provides a more informative base for decision-making. In this next section, you'll learn how to use additional data from Esri Updated Demographics to complement a Daytime Population analysis.
With more than 12,000 variables available in the Esri Updated Demographics portfolio to choose from, knowing how to pair related demographics with your analysis can be challenging. Data pairings can be inspired by ArcGIS Business Analyst Web App reports and infographics, or ArcGIS Living Atlas Maps. Jump to the Learn more section in this tutorial to learn how to access additional resources.
Next, you will examine how to create a custom variable using both Daytime Population and Total Population data.
To uncover where commuters drive the shift in an area's population, a custom data calculation---population change due to commuting is computed.
The image shows the variables and formula used: Daytime Population without Total Population is the Population Change value.
Mapping this variable reveals population change due to commuting in the Greater Boston, CBSA metro area. In the image, the arrow icons depict the direction of change, and the size of the arrow represents the magnitude of change.
For example, areas with positive change (blue up arrows) indicate a daytime population gain (more people commute in).
Areas with negative change (orange down arrows) reflect a daytime population loss (more people commute out).
Analyzing daytime population at the census tract level reveals which communities are impacted the most.
Next, you'll examine how similar data is often used by analysts but is sometimes misunderstood due to how the variables are defined and calculated.
The custom infographic shows how adding business and labor force data, such as Employed Population and Total Employees, can enhance your analysis.
Users may expect data, like Percent in Labor Force in the example infographic, to sum to the total Daytime Population. Why is this not always the case?
Infographic was created using ArcGIS Business Analyst Web App.
To answer the question of why certain data such as Percent in Labor Force may not sum to the total Daytime Population, the terms Employed Population and Total Employees, should be defined.
Total Employed Population Age 16+ data variable refers to the night-time count of the civilian population that are 16 years of age or older living in a given trade area that are employed, regardless of whether or not they work in the area.
A person is classified as employed if they work as paid employees, work in their own business or profession, work on their own farm, or work 15 hours or more as unpaid workers on a family farm of in a family business; or those who did not work but have jobs or businesses from which they are temporarily absent due to illness, bad weather, industrial dispute, or other personal reasons.
Total Employees refers to the number of employed individuals at businesses within a given trade area. It is an aggregation of work location-based employees from one of Esri's data partners, Data Axle. This represents people who work in the area regardless of whether they live in the area.
Notice how the values for the employment variables differ from the Daytime Population, Daytime workers, and Daytime residents estimates.
It's important to remember that Daytime workers includes persons who not only live and work in the same area but also persons commuting into the area for work as well.
Data values for Total Employees are not the same as the value for Daytime workers, because Total Employees does not represent where employees are during the workday (as well as being tabulated differently from Esri's estimate).
Data values for Employed Population do not account for Daytime residents. It only represents how many persons are employed and tabulated based on where they live.
You can access Esri Demographics using Esri software and through apps like ArcGIS Business Analyst , ArcGIS for Excel , or ready to use maps from ArcGIS Living Atlas of the World . For use outside of the Esri platform data files are available in CSV, dBase, Excel, shapefile, or file geodatabase formats.
Contact an Esri data sales specialist with data questions at 800-447-9778 or send an email to: datasales@esri.com
By analyzing this additional data along with daytime population statistics, business leaders can develop comprehensive solutions for areas that exhibit notable changes in population between day and night. The key to using related demographic data in your analysis is knowing the definition for each data component.
See Esri Updated Demographics for more information about Esri Demographic variables or view Use and interpret Esri Civilian Labor Force data .
Daytime Population is the total number of Daytime residents and the total number of Daytime workers present during normal business hours.
Population expansion is most starkly seen in city centers. City centers are generally economic hubs that will contain a substantially larger population during the workday.
When adding other key demographic characteristics such as business data to your analysis be mindful of the measure and how it differs from other Esri data variables.
In this tutorial, you learned about the basics of Daytime Population data, how to interpret the data, and the significant impact it has on a community. Additional data tutorials in two series are available. Click on the links below for continued data exploration, learning, and ways to access the data.
Daytime Population estimates are developed from a mix of inputs from Esri U.S. Updated Demographics , the decennial census, the ACS, and business data from Data Axle. Represented as point-in-time estimates as of July 1, the data is available for Esri’s standard geographic areas and for any user-defined polygon such as a ring or drive time. Read Esri Daytime Population Methodology Statement for more information
Use the data reference page to help answer additional questions about Esri Demographics.
If you have a topic you would like covered in a data tutorial to help you better understand U.S. data, send us an e-mail with your topic idea.