Everyday Proximity Index · Bogotá, Medellín, Cali and Barranquilla
We measured Colombia’s four most populous cities with the same yardstick: for every person counted by the census, how far away, walking along the street network, are food, school, public health, recreation, culture and transit, compared with everyone else in the four cities.
01 · How it is measured
From the point of each census block, the network of streets and paths is traveled to the nearest place of each function. The example is a section of Bosques de San Jorge, in Suba: it is the same calculation as the demonstration on the home page, repeated across the 71,400 inhabited city blocks of the four cities.
02 · A single scale
The index runs from 0 to 100 and compares each person with the 12.3 million people of the four cities: an index of 30 means that person lives farther from everyday life than 70% of them; one of 80, closer than 80%. It is calculated for each of the six functions and averaged. A city’s index is the average of the people who live in it.
Each bar shows how the people of each city are distributed among five groups of equal size across the four cities combined: from the 20% with the least proximity (dark red) to the 20% with the most (cream). If a city resembled the whole, each color would take up a fifth. Click a city to open it in the atlas.
How to read the chart
03 · People and proximity
Each census section has a density, how many people live per hectare of city block, and a proximity index. Crossing the two reveals two situations that call for opposite responses. The thresholds are calculated over the sections of the four cities, weighted by population:
Where many people live with little proximity, services are needed: health, schools, culture and transit where people already live. Where there is high proximity and few people, the city can take in more residents without moving them away from everyday life.
In each city
The four cities, on the map
04 · What is missing
The index sums up six functions, but they are not all missing equally. The table shows each city’s score for each function, from 0 to 100, with the same color scale for the whole table.
People without the service within a fifteen-minute walk
The index compares positions; these bars count absences: the share of each city’s population that has not a single place of that function within 1,200 m along the network.
Public health facilities. Current Ministry of Health register (March 2026 cutoff); in Bogotá, 105 facilities placed at the address where they provide care and checked against the four public health subnetworks.
05 · Interactive atlas
Choose a city and a function, or the crossing of people and proximity. On hover, each section shows its population, its index and the distance to the nearest place of each function. In Bogotá, new construction, height and pedestrian crashes are added.
06 · The four cities
Choose one to open it in the atlas.
07 · Bogotá in depth
We crossed the index with Bogotá’s cadastre and road crash records (Datos Abiertos Bogotá and IDECA). Each census section is placed in its proximity quintile of the four cities; the table compares the five groups.
Sources: change in built area by cadastral block, ten annual periods from 2016 to 2026; average height by block in 2026 (the series changes method in 2023, so years are not compared); road crashes from 2015 to 2021. Pedestrian crashes are counted per resident: in the center, people who live elsewhere also walk.
08 · What we found
Use the index to order investment: bring public health, culture and transit to where the 20% of people with the least proximity live, and steer new housing toward the sections with high proximity and few people.
09 · Validation
Repeating the calculation from the source data, all 66,303 city blocks of Bogotá, Medellín and Barranquilla give the same distances and statuses. City blocks and destinations are connected only to each city’s main pedestrian network, so that internal roads of complexes with no exit to the street do not leave blocks isolated.
Distance from each city block’s point to the nearest street or path, by share of people. City blocks more than 150 m away are not included in the index.
Official destinations by city
How solid the ranking is
The main version (F) uses official inventories where they exist. With OpenStreetMap only (A), Bogotá moves to first place. Cali’s census blocks add up to 81.5% of the 2018 DANE urban population; the index does not distribute the difference.
10 · Data
On request · Cartograma analysisFull documentConceptual framework, method, location validation, results for the four cities with the robustness test and a three-page profile for each city. Sent by email on request.
On request · 5 pagesCartograma noteFindings, maps of the four cities, cross-reading and recommendation.
ZIP · 5 MBIndex tablesIndex and scores by city block (DANE code), summary by city, official sources and analysis of Bogotá by section and by quintile.
AtlasExplorer by sectionThe four cities by census section, with the six functions and the crossing of people and proximity.
For your cityDiscuss a projectThe same method in any municipality in Colombia with open data, refined with each government’s own records.
For your city
The same method works in any municipality in Colombia with open data, and it is refined with each government’s own records.
Discuss a project →