Eden Move Index

Every "best places to live" list is somebody else's weighting of somebody else's data, delivered as a rank with no way to see inside it. Eden Index inverts that: one transparent, reproducible score for all 3,144 US counties and 925 metro and micropolitan areas, from twelve categories of public open data, most of it federal — cost of living, housing, safety, schools, climate, climate risk, healthcare, mobility, outdoors, culture, economy & wages, and community.

WHAT MAKES IT DIFFERENT

• The weights are yours. The default weighting is an editorial judgment, labeled as one — never a neutral truth. Move the sliders and every rank recomputes instantly, on your device.

• Every number is traceable. Tap a score for the categories behind it, a category for its indicators, an indicator for the raw value, its units, its source, and its publication date.

• The gaps are stated, not hidden. Where a place has no monitor or a suppressed estimate, Eden Index says so and marks the score's coverage, rather than filling the hole with an average.

• Unmeasured never means zero. A category that can't be measured for a place has its weight redistributed across what can be measured, so a data gap never drags a place down.

• It works with no signal. Scoring, ranking, and the map run on a factset that ships on your device. Richer detail comes from our API when you have a connection.

A score is a percentile within a stated pool — a way to compare, not a verdict.

WHERE THE DATA COMES FROM

Every indicator names its publisher, dataset, vintage, and publication date on screen. The sources, in full:

• US Census Bureau — American Community Survey, County Business Patterns, Building Permits Survey, Community Resilience Estimates, TIGER/Line and gazetteer geography: census.gov/programs-surveys.html and census.gov/geographies.html
• US Bureau of Labor Statistics — Local Area Unemployment Statistics: bls.gov/lau
• US Bureau of Economic Analysis — Regional Price Parities: bea.gov/data/prices-inflation/regional-price-parities-state-and-metro-area
• FEMA — National Risk Index: fema.gov/flood-maps/products-tools/national-risk-index
• NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information — U.S. Climate Normals 1991-2020: ncei.noaa.gov/products/land-based-station/us-climate-normals
• NASA Langley Research Center — POWER meteorology: power.larc.nasa.gov
• US Geological Survey — Protected Areas Database of the US: usgs.gov/programs/gap-analysis-project
• US Geological Survey and US EPA — NHDPlus V2 hydrography: epa.gov/waterdata
• USDA Forest Service — National Forest System trails: data.fs.usda.gov/geodata/edw/datasets.php
• Recreation.gov — Recreation Information Database: ridb.recreation.gov/download
• National Drought Mitigation Center, University of Nebraska-Lincoln — U.S. Drought Monitor: droughtmonitor.unl.edu
• University of Wisconsin Population Health Institute — County Health Rankings: countyhealthrankings.org
• MIT Election Data and Science Lab — County Presidential Returns: doi.org/10.7910/DVN/VOQCHQ
• Zillow — Home Value Index and Observed Rent Index: zillow.com/research/data
• OpenStreetMap contributors, via Protomaps — basemap: protomaps.com

This product uses the Census Bureau Data API but is not endorsed or certified by the Census Bureau. It uses FEMA's OpenFEMA API but is not endorsed by FEMA, which cannot vouch for analyses derived from its data.

Eden Index is for anyone weighing a move — and for anyone tired of someone else's answer with no way to check it.

DISCLAIMER: Eden Index is an independent app from a private developer. It does not represent a government entity, is not affiliated with or endorsed by any government agency, and provides no government service. It republishes public open data; every source is named and linked below.