A different way of looking at crime statistics.

June 15, 2010 10:14 AM

Topographical Representation of Crime in San Francisco
posted by terrirodriguez (36 comments total)

Topographical, not topological.

And I was looking forward to seeing some donuts, or were those coffee cups?
posted by kmz at 10:17 AM on June 15, 2010

Cool. It's like a heat map, but more difficult to use.
posted by demiurge at 10:19 AM on June 15, 2010 [4 favorites]

Bottom line: In San Francisco, you want to live at the top of a real hill but the bottom of a virtual hill.
posted by DU at 10:23 AM on June 15, 2010 [4 favorites]

Looks like downtown has everything.
posted by ZaneJ. at 10:23 AM on June 15, 2010 [3 favorites]

Both the real hills and the virtual hills have interesting views. Just for different values of "interesting."
posted by GenjiandProust at 10:25 AM on June 15, 2010

Here is the creator's site: http://dougmccune.com/blog/2010/06/05/if-san-francisco-crime-was-elevation/.
posted by sanko at 10:26 AM on June 15, 2010

There's something about that image I find really disturbing. It creeps me out. It's not that it depicts crime, either. It looks like the darkness of the human soul.

Nice infographic. Too bad about humanity.
posted by A Terrible Llama at 10:29 AM on June 15, 2010 [3 favorites]

splice typo. definitely shouldn't do several internet-y things at a time. sorry about that. definitely know it it was topographical.
posted by terrirodriguez at 10:32 AM on June 15, 2010

My, that's a LOT of hookers!
posted by briank at 10:37 AM on June 15, 2010

Topological Representation of Crime in San Francisco

So that's why the cops are always found at donut shops!
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 10:40 AM on June 15, 2010 [2 favorites]

[Retrotypographication accomplished.]
posted by cortex at 10:40 AM on June 15, 2010 [4 favorites]

And people from the city are always freaking out about Oakland.
posted by yeloson at 10:43 AM on June 15, 2010 [1 favorite]

Terrific mapmaking.

Those car chases have melded into a single Generic San Francisco Car Chase, for which you need: several police cruisers, sirens wailing, in hot pursuit of a getaway vehicle (all cars preferably pre 1980); a route down precariously steep streets (rarely up, for obvious speed-related reasons); the cars giving chase in permanent near-collision with the cross-traffic on level avenues and bending their fenders in a constant bump and grind on roads not inclined to accommodate high speeds; and to top it all off, split-second views of the Golden Gate Bridge and Alcatraz, both parked on the glistening blue waters of the Bay below the city.

You can't think of San Francisco car chases without watching "Bullitt." Seriously, see it now if you have never seen it. If continuity problems annoy you, though, be prepared for a sudden shift in one scene from the Marina and the Presidio to turning a corner into -- Visitacion Valley.

Its elevation, mainly in the city’s centre, is responsible for a 20% variance in annual rainfall throughout its eastern and western precincts, with bay-fronted neighbourhoods in the east also significantly less cold, windy and foggy than those facing the ocean.

When I think of things I miss most about SF, the microclimates are near or at the top of the list.
posted by blucevalo at 10:43 AM on June 15, 2010

There is an unsurprising but depressing matching set of hills for prostitution, narcotics, assault, and warrants. Gives a pretty clear image of how these things are all in feedback loops on each other.
posted by Babblesort at 10:44 AM on June 15, 2010

I used to live on the edge of the Tenderloin. I remember after Terence Hallinan was elected as DA and announced he wouldn't prosecute "victimless crimes" the number of scantily-dressed women hanging out at bus stops seemed to double overnight.

I also remember giving my parents very roundabout directions to my apartment to keep them from heading straight up Leavenworth and getting an eyeful of the local color.

It appears things haven't changed much.
posted by ambrosia at 10:45 AM on June 15, 2010

I was expecting a victimless Klein bottle.

(* curse you Cortex. It was more fun topological. *)
posted by warbaby at 10:50 AM on June 15, 2010 [3 favorites]

It appears things haven't changed much.

Nothing ever changes in the Tenderloin.
posted by blucevalo at 10:58 AM on June 15, 2010

Klein bottles aren't victimless. You just can't tell where the victim begins and the criminal ends.
posted by Babblesort at 10:58 AM on June 15, 2010 [3 favorites]

Babblesort, that's the Tenderloin and it looks like this.
posted by migurski at 11:00 AM on June 15, 2010 [1 favorite]

Looks like someone got extremely bored with their SimCity.

Seriously though, very neat.
posted by pyrex at 11:04 AM on June 15, 2010

I was wondering if this was going to show up. One thing to keep in mind is the disclaimer from the creator's site: These maps were generated from real data, but please don’t take them as being accurate. The data was aggregated geographically and artistically rendered. This is meant more as an art piece than an informative visualization.
posted by rtha at 11:04 AM on June 15, 2010

Of course, vehicle theft is most prevalent and most widespread. What a waste of taxpayer money.
posted by mrgrimm at 11:07 AM on June 15, 2010

Much like Eliot Spitzer, I live in the shadow of prostitution.
posted by quadog at 11:11 AM on June 15, 2010

Oh to live on
Hooker Mountain
With the punters
And the other maroons
It'll cost you twenty
On Hooker Mountain
Though you run the risk of
Going to John School
Going to John School
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 11:16 AM on June 15, 2010 [2 favorites]

" I believe you find life such a problem because you think there are the good people and the bad people," said the man. "You're wrong, of course. There are, always and only, the bad people, but some of them are on opposite sides".

He waved his thin hand towards the city and walked over to the window.

"A great rolling sea of evil," he said, almost proprietorially. "Shallower in some places, of course, but deeper, oh, so much deeper in others. But people like you put together little rafts of rules and vaguely good intentions and say, this is the opposite, this will triumph in the end. Amazing!"

From "Guards, Guards" by Terry Pratchett.
posted by TheophileEscargot at 11:20 AM on June 15, 2010 [1 favorite]

Bottom line: In San Francisco, you want to live at the top of a real hill but the bottom of a virtual hill.

There's a strong correlation between geographic height and socioeconomic class here. Take the #22 bus from Pacific Heights through the Western Addition to the Mission, for example.
posted by kirkaracha at 11:41 AM on June 15, 2010 [1 favorite]

I thought it was going to be a Typographical Representation of Crime in San Francisco, and I was like, 'hoo boy, here we go again with the Comic Sans.'
posted by redsparkler at 12:03 PM on June 15, 2010

hoo boy, here we go again with the Comic Sans

That's a paddlin'
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 12:05 PM on June 15, 2010

I thought the title was Typographical Representation of Crime in San Francisco.
posted by christopherious at 12:07 PM on June 15, 2010

Forgot to preview and missed the other comments saying the same thing. So "I, too, thought...".
posted by christopherious at 12:09 PM on June 15, 2010

Oakland would be the fucking Matterhorn.
posted by plexi at 1:09 PM on June 15, 2010

plexi, you'd think so but it's not actually the case. The Tenderloin is a much more concentrated location for crime than any part of Oakland.
posted by migurski at 1:31 PM on June 15, 2010 [2 favorites]

Oakland would be the fucking Matterhorn.

Shrug. This is the thing- people act as if crime is completely random- most of the violence and serious crime is between folks all involved in sketchy activities to begin with. It has less to do with real concerns about crimes and more to do with projecting fear and discomfort issues around poor folks of color.

If you take that into account, the rest of the numbers are pretty comparable.
posted by yeloson at 1:34 PM on June 15, 2010 [1 favorite]

I think Oakland would look like a jello mold of itself.
posted by iamkimiam at 2:21 PM on June 15, 2010 [1 favorite]

As a very smart friend of mine said, when I posted this to facebook last week, and I paraphrase: this is a map of where offenses are policed, NOT where they actually happen. These are maps of where people are arrested, because they come to the notice of police. They come to the notice of the police because they are more likely to be homeless, among other statuses, and their drug use is more visible.

That's not a map of the actual distribution of illicit drug use in San Francisco, for example. It's a map of where people are arrested for drug use, which is not the same thing at all. bv
posted by gingerbeer at 5:37 PM on June 15, 2010 [5 favorites]

That's not a map of the actual distribution of illicit drug use in San Francisco, for example.

That wouldn't be very interesting; it'd just be a cube.
posted by clorox at 3:04 AM on June 16, 2010