Below is a data visualization on crime in Cincinnati. The data set is a compilation of weekly crime reports from the Cincinnati Police from January 1, 2013 through June 9, 2013. This visualization utilizes many of the new features in Tableau 8, most importantly the floating tiles feature.
The main Crime Dashboard features a droplet chart that I developed a few years ago as an easy way to detect patterns in a small space. I has similar features as a heat map and a sparkline, but shown in a calendar format, similar to an Outlook or Google Calendar. The details of the droplet chart are available on the tooltip as well as on other areas of the visualization. The Crime Dashboard is also interactive allowing the user to click on any individual point on the crime map. This will show a satellite image of the property where the crime occurred as well as a custom option for toggling between the Street View and Satellite View of the property. In addition, when selecting a point it will highlight the other crimes that happened on the same day and time slot on both the crime map and the droplet chart.
The Geo Optimization tab is a visualization of 7 key crimes in the neighborhood that all had similar narratives. Each of these crimes had 3 suspects described or a similar event took place. Using a geo optimization algorithm in R, I calculated the centroid of these 7 crimes and mapped it in Tableau. For information on how this is done in R see here. There is a park and a large apartment complex within one block of the centroid and this tab includes a Street View link to explore this area. The analysts at the Cincinnati Police found this analysis very interesting and are looking into this further.
The Key Statistics tab is a summary of crime year-to-date (through May where applicable because June, 2013 is not a complete month yet). Clicking on the bar chart will filter the day of the week and time of day. The Crime Over Time tab shows crime in the neighborhood day by day. Since Tableau Public does not offer a “play” button there is a link to a YouTube video that shows a time-lapse of this tab. The Major Crime Incident shows a specific crime that grabbed national attention that occurred just outside the City of Cincinnati. The About tab lists information on the author as well as a link to a PDF document on how to build the Crime Dashboard.
Please Note – This visualization was designed with a full canvas size. It is best viewed on a full laptop or desktop screen. It was not created for smaller blog posts or tablets.
