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Learn more about Boston’s data and trends with Imagine Boston

Oct 20, 2016

Join Imagine Boston 2030 and the Boston Planning & Development Agency’s (BPDA) Research Division for the first of our "Boston by the Numbers" events, a series of public conversations to provide an opportunity to learn and discuss how Boston’s trends and data can help to guide our future.

Imagine Boston 2030 is the City of Boston’s first major city wide planning effort in 50 years. The initiative launched in September 2015 with thousands of Bostonians contributing their insights on how to shape the city’s future. In spring 2016, the Imagine Boston 2030 team released Guiding Growth, establishing Bostonians’ goals for inclusive growth. This fall, Imagine Boston will launch a strategic vision plan that outlines some of initiatives that the City will undertake. Specifically, the document will identify potential strategies for addressing the issues that matter most to Bostonians, from economic mobility and education to affordable housing, open space, transportation, and climate change.

As the issues Bostonians are facing become clearer, the need to understand Boston’s history and trends has also become apparent. Imagine Boston 2030 is excited to announce a partnership with the BPDA to curate a series of informational presentations about major trends in the city. Boston by the Numbers​ ​will give residents more context around the factors that have shaped Boston’s past and those shaping Boston’s future; and, by doing so, the series will explore how trends can guide conversations for the citywide planning process.

From the beginning, Imagine Boston has maintained that this planning process must be led by Boston’s residents, community organizations, and stakeholders. During the past year, Imagine Boston has engaged new and established residents from all neighborhoods, ages, and demographics in over 12,000 interactions. Through online and text commentaries, community meetings, postcards, workshops, fairs, and street outreach, these conversations have driven the development of our vision and actions for the future.

Please join us as we learn about Boston’s people, businesses and visitors, as informed by data, to think about how such information might influence our planning process going forward. After a brief presentation, each session will end with a Q&A period led by staff from the BPDA and Imagine Boston 2030.

The first talk will be on “Understanding Boston’s Population, from the Past to the Future” on Wednesday, October 26, 6:30 to 8 p.m.​ at the Shelburne Community Center, located at 2730 Washington Street, Roxbury 02119.

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