Tuesday, January 09, 2018

Census 2016 Sapmap Area: County Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown #Census

I often use census data in my Statistics classes (they are a great source of non-normal data) - this year I will be able to use the 2016 census results for the first time. One of the most interesting sets of data is from the Small Area Population statistics - you can look up your county or right down to your local area. The county Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown (DLR) has a population of 218,018 - this includes me. It is also one of the wealthiest parts of Ireland (this does not include me!). Data are easily downloadable in Excel or PDF format.

An interesting analysis to make is to examine how people commute to work. DLR is well-served by public transport with trains DART, LUAS, and plenty of bus lanes. The pie chart below (created in Tableau) shows the breakdown of the census figure for "Population aged 5 years and over by means of travel to work" - this represents 94,397 people.

Data source: Census 2016.
Despite some of the best public transport infrastructure in the country, 47,577 (50.4%) of us still travel by car to work. Train, DART or LUAS is a distant second with 14,094 (14.9%) using this to travel to work. Only 7,781 (8.2%) use buses.

Despite the well-documented increase in the number of people cycling to work, only 5,770 (6.1%) do so in DLR - this is less than the number (6,875 or 7.3%) of people who walk to work. For my own mode of transport (motorcycle) I am one of the 805 (0.9%) people who reported in the census that we use a "motorcycle or scooter" to travel to work.

More to follow!

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