US2020 Sources

We aim to determine the population's unemployment rate near Seattle schools by utilizing the available Open Datasets nodes, such as US2020 Census Data and Tiger Map.

To use the workflow, download and run it on the KNIME Analytics Platform. For optimal performance using the Geospatial Analytics extension, make sure you are using version 4.7.4 or higher.
The input data has been saved in the workflow data area, simply execute the components "Read Dataset" to obtain the necessary data.

This workflow aims to create a map of Seattle that shows different socioeconomic features by tract. This type of map is called a choropleth map, which uses colours to represent statistical information about a particular region, such as population density or income per person.

Using the US2020 Tiger Map node, we can select the specific state, county, and level of geography (TIGER/Line data type) we want to extract. The geography levels are arranged from highest to lowest, starting with country, state, county, tract, block group, and finally, block.

To gather data for Washington State and King County (where Seattle is located), we utilized node configurations 53 and 033, respectively. You must use the county code's last three digits (53033). If you need to find the FIPS codes for states and counties, please refer to the "External resources" links.
We obtained maps at the block group geography level, explicitly using bg20, where "bg" stands for the block group and "20" represents the Census year number.

To calculate the unemployment rate, we utilize the US2020 Census Data node. To do this, we enter the same state and county codes used for the US2020 Tiger Map but include "*" to gather data from all tracts in King County. It is crucial to choose the same geographical level as the Tiger Map, specifically block groups, and select "Make Census GEOIDs compatible with Tiger/Line GEOIDs" to merge the socioeconomic data with the Tiger Map results properly.

It's time to select the socioeconomic features we wish to retrieve. We have several options: total population, ethnic group, and active population. To fetch the data, you'll need to enter an API key, which you can obtain by following the instructions in the "External resources" section link.

To determine the unemployment rate in the area surrounding the school, we gather data on the total active population (H1_001N), the occupied population (H1_002N), and the unemployed population (H1_003N).

A crucial part of the workflow is extracting only the socioeconomic data for the school's location using the Spatial Join node. Simply execute the component to obtain the necessary data. Within the Spatial Join node configuration, select "Inner" as the joining mode and "Contains" as the Match mode to retain only the block groups with schools.

We plot the block groups, adding socioeconomic features and school names as tooltips using the Geospatial View node. We have also coloured the block groups based on their unemployment rate.

External resources

• Seattle Public Schools Sites 2022-2023
• How to request the US2020 Census Data API key?
• US Census Variables codes
• FIPS codes to select state and county in the US2020 open datasets nodes