The Urban Portal

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Assisted Housing: National and Local

U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD)
Picture of Subsidized Households describes the households living in HUD-subsidized housing in the United States for the year providing data from the 1970s through 2008. There is information describing the characteristics of assisted housing units and residents, summarized at various levels, including: national, state, public housing agency (PHA), project, census tract, county, Core-Based Statistical Area and city levels.

Filed under: Data

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Black Metropolis Research Consortium

Columbia College, Chicago Public Library, Chicago History Museum, Chicago State University, DePaul University, Dominican University, DuSable Museum of African American History, Illinois Institute of Technology, Kennedy King College, Loyola University, Roosevelt University, Northwestern University, University of Illinois Chicago, University of Chicago
The Black Metropolis Research Consortium (BMRC) is an unincorporated Chicago-based association of libraries, universities, and other archival institutions with major holdings of materials that document African American and African diasporic culture, history, and politics, with a specific focus on materials relating to Chicago. The University of Chicago serves as Host Institution of the BMRC.
The BMRC is dedicated to making broadly accessible its members' holdings of materials that document African American and African diasporic culture, history, and politics, with a specific focus on materials relating to Chicago.

Filed under: Organizations

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Center for Metropolitan History

University of London
The Centre for Metropolitan History (CMH), established by the Institute in 1988, is one of the world’s leading centers for the study of the history of London and other metropolises. It specializes in innovative research projects, covering a wide range of periods, themes and problems in metropolitan history, publishing the results and data online and in print. The Center runs a seminar, and organizes workshops and conferences on many different topics in metropolitan and urban history. 

Filed under: Organizations

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Center for Urban History (Leicester)

University of Leicester
Established in 1985, the Centre for Urban History (CUH) is a specialist research center of international academic excellence which attracts MA and PhD students from around the world. The Centre maintains active links with academics and research institutions across the globe.

Filed under: Organizations

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Center for Urban History of East Central Europe (Ukraine)

As an institute of historical scholarship, we seek to offer fresh intellectual impulses and help abandon dated questions and preconceived answers. By information and open discussion, we try to help prevent history from being abused for political ends. Through conferences, seminars and exhibitions we hope to promote scholarly and cultural exchange.

Filed under: Organizations

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Economic and Social Data Service

The Economic and Social Data Service is a national data archiving and dissemination service in the UK which came into operation in January 2003. The service is a jointly-funded initiative sponsored by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) and the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC).

The ESDS is a distributed service, based on a collaboration between four key centres of expertise:

UK Data Archive (UKDA), University of Essex
Institute for Social and Economic Research (ISER) , University of Essex
Manchester Information and Associated Services (MIMAS), University of Manchester
Cathie Marsh Centre for Census and Survey Research (CCSR), University of Manchester

These centres work collaboratively to provide preservation, dissemination, user support and training for an extensive range of key economic and social data, both quantitative and qualitative, spanning many disciplines and themes. The ESDS provides an integrated service offering enhanced support for the secondary use of data across the research, learning and teaching communities.

Filed under: Data

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European Association for Urban History

The European Association for Urban History was established in 1989 with the support of the European Union. The Association organizes conferences every two years. These biannual conferences provide a multidisciplinary forum for historians, sociologists, geographers, anthropologists, art and architectural historians, economists, planners and all others working on different aspects of urban history. Membership in the Association is free of charge, and is demonstrated by repeated active participation at the conferences. The Association supports participation of young scholars by stipends, which cover registration fees, and since 2010 it even offers mobility stipends in a limited number of justified cases. The first conference took place in Amsterdam in 1992.

Filed under: Organizations

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Journal of Planning History

Society for American City and Regional Planning History
Journal of Planning History (JPH), peer-reviewed and published quarterly, focuses on the history of city and regional planning, with particular emphasis on the Americas. JPH covers the full range of topics embraced by city and regional planning history, including planning history in the Americas, transnational planning experiences, planning history pedagogy, planning history in planning practice, the intellectual roots of the planning processes, and planning history historiography.

Filed under: Journals

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Journal of Urban History

The Journal of Urban History (JUH), peer-reviewed and published bi-monthly, provides scholars and professionals with the latest research, analyses, and discussion on the history of cities and urban societies throughout the world. JUH presents original research by distinguished authors from the variety of fields concerned with urban history. Each insightful issue offers the latest scholarship on such topics as public housing, migration, urban growth, and more.

Filed under: Journals

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Late 19th- and Early 20th-Century Urban Rail Transit Maps

University of Chicago
The maps included on this site roughly illustrate the history of urban rail transit between the 1860s and the 1920s. These years were the heyday of urban rail transit. Virtually every city in the Western world and in its colonial offshoots had street railroads during much or all of this period. Streetcars were drawn by horses in the early years. The invention of the grip cable in 1870s and of electric traction in the late 1880s greatly increased their speed and reliability. By the end of the 19th century, everyday urban life was completely dependent on this mode of transport.

Filed under: Data

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London Lives

University of Hertfordshire, University of Sheffield, Economic and Social Research Council, HRI
A searchable resource on crime, poverty, and social policy in London from 1690-1800 featuring 240,000 manuscripts from 8 archives, and 15 datasets, with access to 3.35 million names.

Filed under: Data

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Mothers Alone : Poverty and the Fatherless Family, 1955-1966 UK

Economic and Social Data Service
The study explores the lives and experiences of mothers living alone: unmarried, separated, divorced or widowed. The study posed two questions: what is poverty and who are the fatherless? The study asked about housing conditions, homelessness, diet and nutrition, family relations, marriage and marital breakdowns, and the levels and adequacy of community and national assistance. The interviewees were asked about detailed indicators of poverty and also the subjective, felt experience of poverty. The study examined problems families faced as a consequence of both low income and lack of fathers, the causes of their circumstances, and the adequacy of assistance provided by community and national sources. 

Filed under: Data

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Museum of the City of New York

Museum of the City of New York explores the past of New York and celebrates New York’s heritage of diversity, opportunity, and perpetual transformation.

Filed under: Organizations

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National Historical Geographic Information System

The National Historical Geographic Information System (NHGIS) provides, free of charge, aggregate census data and GIS-compatible boundary files for the United States between 1790 and 2000.

Filed under: Data

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National Longitudinal Surveys

Bureau of Labor Statistics
The National Longitudinal Surveys (NLS) are a set of surveys designed to gather information at multiple points in time on the labor market activities and other significant life events of several groups of men and women. For more than 4 decades, NLS data have served as an important tool for economists, sociologists, and other researchers.

Filed under: Data

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Panel Study of Income Dynamics

University of Michigan
The Panel Study of Income Dynamics - PSID - is the longest running longitudinal household survey in the world. The study began in 1968 with a nationally representative sample of over 18,000 individuals living in 5,000 families in the United States. Information on these individuals and their descendants has been collected continuously, including data covering employment, income, wealth, expenditures, health, marriage, childbearing, child development, philanthropy, education, and numerous other topics. The PSID is directed by faculty at the University of Michigan, and the data are available on this website without cost to researchers and analysts.

The data are used by researchers, policy analysts, and teachers around the globe. Over 3,000 peer-reviewed publications have been based on the PSID. Recognizing the importance of the data, numerous countries have created their own PSID-like studies that now facilitate cross-national comparative research. The National Science Foundation recognized the PSID as one of the 60 most significant advances funded by NSF in its 60 year history.

Filed under: Data

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Research Center for Urban Cultural History

University of Massachusetts Boston
The Research Center for Urban Cultural History (RCUCH) premises its work on the multi-disciplinary study of cities as dynamic sites where cultures are generated, renegotiated and transmitted. Housed within an institution of higher learning with a commitment to an urban mission and an exceptionally diverse student body, and located in a city richly endowed with intellectual resources, the RCUCH initiates and facilitates scholarly and teaching projects that explore a wide array of possible links between studies of cities in the U.S. and throughout the world, encompassing both contemporary and historical topics. The Center's educational, scholarly, and outreach activities are directed toward achieving a flexible, comprehensive and innovative approach to urban cultural history in a global context.

The Center's principal focus is on interdisciplinary and collaborative research and teaching in urban cultural history. This field focuses on: the specificity of the urban setting and its environs; spatial definition; demographic and economic shifts; temporal change; cultural exchange and cultural transformation; and discursive and signifying networks created by the production of meaning between groups and populations.

Filed under: Organizations

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Research Committee 21

International Sociological Association
Research Committee 21 (RC21) on the Sociology of Urban and Regional Development of the International Sociological Association was established in 1970 to promote theory and research in the sociology of urban and regional development, and - in so doing - create an international community of scholars who will advance the field.

At a time when cities, towns, and regions, and the world more broadly, are undergoing profound change, these international links are of critical importance for promoting and advancing scholarship. Web pages, such as this, and e-mail, provide mechanisms for more easily enabling and maintaining these contacts.

Through this page, we wish to provide as much information as possible, both to RC21 members and non members, including providing links to other sites of interest.

Filed under: Organizations

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Seattle Municipal Archives

City of Seattle
The Seattle Municipal Archives (SMA) holds over 10,000 cubic feet of records documenting the history, development, and activities of the agencies and elected officials of Seattle. Some of the research strengths of the holdings include parks, engineering, legislative activities, and urban planning. 

Filed under: Links

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Social Explorer

Social Explorer contains over 18,000 maps, hundreds of profile reports, 40 billion data elements, 335,000 variables and 220 years of data. Interactive mapping and reporting tools let you explore a vast array of demographic data quickly and easily. Available Maps and Reports Include: Census data from 1790 to 2010, American Community Survey (all), Religion data from InfoGroup 2009, Religion data from RCMS 1980 to 2000, Carbon emissions from the Vulcan Project/

Filed under: Data

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Social Science History Association Urban Network

The urban network endeavors to bring social scientific and historical modes of analysis to the urban form. We are interested in the historical trajectory of the city, the spatial forms linked to the urban life, social arrangements, governance and politics, the specificity of urban economics, cultural forms that emerge and thrive in cities, urban institutions, place identities, real and imagined urban forms, and the historical trajectory of specifically urban phenomena across regional, temporal, and cultural categories. As a collective enterprise, the urban network seeks to highlight the unique scholarship, insight, and activities related to the city in a forum that encourages new ideas, dialogue, and innovation.

Filed under: Organizations

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The Encyclopedia of Greater Philadelphia

Mid-Atlantic Regional Center for the Humanities, Rutgers University
The Encyclopedia of Greater Philadelphia is a civic project to increase understanding of one of America’s greatest cities. From abolition and the American Revolution to yellow fever and zoos (with cheesesteaks, rowhouses, and hundreds of other topics in between), the digital Encyclopedia volume and its print volume will offer the most comprehensive, authoritative reference source ever created for the Philadelphia region.

Filed under: Links

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The Great Chicago Fire and the Web of Memory

Chicago History Museum
The Great Chicago Fire & the Web of Memory consists of two main parts. The first part, titled The Great Chicago Fire, includes five chronologically organized sections that together present a history of the fire.  The sections of the second part, The Web of Memory, examine six ways in which the fire has been remembered:  eyewitness accounts, contemporary journalism and illustrations, imaginative forms such as literature and art, the legend of Mrs. O'Leary and her cow, fire souvenirs of many different kinds, and formal commemorations and exhibitions. Each of the sections has three integrated components: thematic galleries of images, a library of texts, and an interpretive essay.

Filed under: Links

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Urban Planning, 1794-1918: An International Anthology of Articles, Conference Papers, and Reports

Cornell University
This site includes documents that are primary source material for the study of how urban planning developed up to the end of World War I. They include statements about techniques, principles, theories, and practice by those who helped to create a new professional specialization. This new field of city planning grew out of the land-based professions of architecture, engineering, surveying, and landscape architecture, as well as from the work of economists, social workers, lawyers, public health specialists, and municipal administrators.

Filed under: Links

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Urbanities

Urbanities is an international academic peer-reviewed journal. The Editorial and Scientific Boards reflect the journal’s aims and broad ethnographic spread, and include international scholars who specialize in different ethnographic and theoretical fields.

Urbanities aims at publishing original articles on research at the forefront of the discipline, at exploring new trends and debates in Urban Anthropology that promote critical scholarship in international anthropology and at highlighting the contribution of urban research to the broader society. Articles published in the journal are ethnographically based and address theoretical, methodological or public issues concerning all aspects of urban research. Urbanities is also committed to promoting debate between socio-cultural anthropology and biological anthropology as well as between anthropology and other cognate disciplines. 

Filed under: Journals

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Urbanization and Global Change Group

Yale University
Urbanization. Global Change. Sustainability.
These words denote paramount human and environmental concerns for the 21st Century.  The Urbanization and Global Change Group at Yale University works at the intersection of these three concepts.   Examining rapidly urbanizing regions around the world, with a focus on China and India, the Group's research aims to uncover the drivers behind urbanization, the role of globalization in the urban process and the environmental impacts of urban land expansion.   The Group is interested both in understanding fundamental processes to advance academic knowledge and in crafting rules-of-thumb for policy application.

The four fundamental questions are: How urban areas have grown in the past?  What drives urban land expansion?  How and where will urban areas likely expand in the future?  What are the environmental impacts of urban land expansion?  Methodologically, the group employs remote sensing analysis, geographic information science, statistics, systems modeling, stakeholder interviews, fieldwork and historical assessments.

Filed under: Organizations

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Visualizing Urban Geographies

National Library of Scotland
Visualising Urban Geographies is a project that provides mapping tools for historians. It enables them to use digitized and geo-referenced maps in conjunction with historical information based on either addresses or districts. This spatial dimension enriches historical understanding and analysis, and can also be applied to other subject areas. The focus on Edinburgh is deliberate: to explore the potential of the mapping tools where there is available data and a wide range of suitable maps.

Filed under: Links

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