Introduction
The interactive visualization appeared in Washington Post. It aims to understand the average income and the number of people with colleges in different neighborhoods searchable by postal code. It shows the comparison between US national average and selected zip code average in the fields of income and education.
What I like
- Usage of both map and a text box to select the zip code for which I need information
- Usage of colors to differentiate different ranking of zip code based on income and highest level of education. Yellow being the highest to blue being the lowest
- The information is present for the entire US which is a good thing as I can compare any zip code
- Zoom out and zoom in feature which helps in easy maneuvering of the map
What needs improvement
- Wastage of space for the map
- Information present is less
- No comparison between different zip codes, you can only compare selected zip code with national averages
- A lot more information can be added like race, ethnic backgrounds, crime rate etc, this would have given even more insights to the income/ education to other factors.
I would like to conclude by saying that although the visualization does not talk about a claim or action or audience, it is a excellent data discovery tool for anyone who is interested to make targeted decisions based on the income/education details like a new marketing or development activities.
Source – http://visual.ly/washington-world-apart?view=true