Statistical Proof: Somerville is young, old, liberal, and green

[ryanwanger.livejournal.com]

If you love random statistics, stay away from www.city-data.com

From their Top 100 lists, which covers US cities of 5000+ residents:

Somerville has some of the Oldest Houses - Average of 61.3 Years Old - 41st overall (Whiting, Indiana is #1)
Somerville has some of the Oldest Housing but Youngest Residents - Average age of 31.1 Years Old - 11th overall (Oneata, NY is #1, Cambridge, is 56th, Boston 63rd)

And from their Top 101 Lists:
Somerville has one of the largest gay male populations - 59th overall (Cambridge is 41st and Boston is 11th)
Somerville has one of the largest lesbian populations - 13th overall (Cambridge is 5th, and Boston is 37th)
Despite our seemingly full street parking outlook, Somerville has very few cars per household - 15.4% of all households have no vehicle - 16th overall (10 of the cities above it are in the NY/NJ metro area, Boston is 17th overall, Cambridge is 27th)
Very few people drive alone to work in Somerville - 45.3% - 52nd overall (Cambridge is 19th, Boston is 40th)
Somerville has one of the highest percentages of people taking the subway to work - 18.5% - 10th overall (3rd excluding NY/NJ, Cambridge is 17th, Boston is 18th, and MA has 7 of the top 20)
Somerville has tons of people who bike to work - 2.8% - 72nd overall (Cambridge is 35th)

I guess part of me always thought we just SAID we were awesome. Nice to have some actual proof!

Phew. Anyone see any that I missed?

(I've also posted this over on my blog complete with hyperlinks to each of the individual lists)

Comments

[nonnihil.livejournal.com]

This raises an interesting and amusing survey question: How much younger/older are you than the house you live in?

I'm ~70 years younger than my house. I bet there are a lot of us in that range...

[ron_newman]

I'm surprised that Somerville, with one subway station, would have a higher percentage of subway commuters than Cambridge, with six.

[curiositykt.livejournal.com]

56 years younger than my house.

[ron_newman]

28 years younger than my apartment building.

[ryanwanger.livejournal.com]

Good point Ron. My guesses:
-Somerville doesn't have a lot of jobs, so everyone has to leave the city for work whereas Cambridge has a lot of people (and students) that can potentially walk/bike (as shown, they are higher up on the bike to work ranking, and http://www.city-data.com/top2/h39.html which shows that almost 25% of people in Cambridge walk to work)
-I see more people commuting into Cambridge on the T for work, than out of (or within) Cambridge for work

Either way, let's not make this too public...or they'll rethink the green line extension! Or maybe it's extra motivation, can you imagine how high that percentage will jump when it's finally built? If we can go from 18.5% to 32.5%...we'll be #1 (outside of NY/NJ)...although the only two non NY/NJ cities ahead of us already are tiny (5000 and 8000 people)

[cityofbeige.livejournal.com]

About 100 years younger here.

[ifotismeni]

very cool!

[miss-chance.livejournal.com]

What's our population, roughly? 2.8% of what? I've often wondered how many bike commuters we are, and have wanted to write the cities of Som. and Cam. about the hazardous conditions they've left at the Beacon/Somerville Ave intersection, with a note that says "with xxx bicycles commuters in the city, this is a matter that must be considered." I was going to make up a number, but now you've provided me with actual citable data. Thanks!

[ryanwanger.livejournal.com]

74,554 people, according to them.

Which would be 2087.5 commuting via bicycle.

[ryanwanger.livejournal.com]

Also, here is the direct url to the city-data list:
http://www.city-data.com/top2/h38.html

[ron_newman]

What is the particular issue at that intersection?

The city plans to stripe bike lanes on Beacon Street this spring, and Somerville Avenue will also have them when the current construction is finished (unfortunately, that's probably two years away).

[ryanwanger.livejournal.com]

Here is the pdf about the project...it's pretty awesome looking.
http://www.somervillema.gov/CoS_Content/documents/97078%20Presentation%204-23-07.pdf

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

About 55 years younger, give or take a few years.

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

We have 2 subway stations (Davis and Sullivan Square).

[ryanwanger.livejournal.com]

Give or take whose? Yours, or the house?

[rainoftoads.livejournal.com]

Technically Sullivan Square is in Charlestown.

[ifotismeni]

oh wow!! that is really exciting. i've been wondering what somerville's been up to with all the construction going on lately.

[miss-chance.livejournal.com]

The problem is that in the mean time they leave that intersection in a way that is barely safe for cars to travel and downright hazardous to bicycles. The road surface has several places with sudden 6 - 8" drops to where they have dug up and then hot-patched. For months there was open gravel, and at one point (when I did call in about it) there was a 12" shear drop that ran parallel to the direction of traffic. If you are riding home at night up Beacon and making the turn onto Somerville, you pretty much have to run the red light so that you can have the intersection to yourself without cars, because the path that a bicycle has to travel to get through there changes and you can't make sudden swerves left and right to avoid the worst of it, when there is also traffic with you. That turn is probably the worst part of my commute. The cities need to learn to look at road-surface conditions from the point of view of the 2,000 cyclists who have navigate the area, and not just from the point of view of people who drive pick-up trucks.

[pushupstairs.livejournal.com]

even though it's only about 12 feet over the city line, Sullivan is actually in Charlestown.

[clevernonsense.livejournal.com]

I would agree that Cambridge is a working city, which means many people who live there work there. Somerville I think leans much more to the residential city.

I think more people at my work live near davis than live near all the cambridge redline stops combined. Though that's just a small sample of my friends there but still...

As for age difference, the house I grew up in is 216 years older than me, roughly :)

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

Oh, I'm about 55 years younger than the house. :-)

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

Oops, I didn't know thar.

[ron_newman]

Sullivan Square is not in Somerville. It's nearby, but then so is Porter Square.

[ron_newman]

That's worth a call to 311, absolutely. I usually go through that intersection by turning left on Somerville Avenue then immediately right on Mossland, fitting my northbound bicycle neatly between the southbound cars and the parked ones, then left on Elm.

[ayelle.livejournal.com]

Me too! I quickly felt very at home here.