Free public datasets for research: ACS, CDC PLACES, and NLR are now available on the Dewey platform

Free datasets are now on the Dewey platform, available to researchers with and without a Dewey subscription (if you don’t have a Dewey subscription, you can access these datasets by making an account with a valid .edu email address). 

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Hosting these public datasets on the Dewey platform makes data access even easier: we’re removing the sourcing friction, simplifying joins and bulk downloads, and providing academic researchers with a one-stop-shop for data discovery, documentation, and management. It’s another way we can ease data workflows and support happy researching. 

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Get inspired by the publications and project ideas these free datasets support, and let us know what other open-access dataset you’d like us to add next!

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Free datasets on Dewey:

American Community Survey (ACS) 5-year data

The American Community Survey is an ongoing survey conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau since 2005, sampling about 3.5 million addresses per year [1]. It’s the workhorse demographic survey of U.S. social science, supplying population denominators, income distributions, and demographic covariates behind place-based research in economics, sociology, public health, real estate, and beyond. The 5-year estimates pool responses to produce reliable statistics for small geographies, down to the block group. 

ACS 5-Year Tables on Dewey

• Median Household Income: Median household income for every U.S. block group.
• Household Income Brackets: Full income distribution behind the median estimate, with household counts in 16 income brackets, plus paired margin-of-error and totals.
• Age & Sex: Population by age bracket and sex for every U.S. block group.
• Race: Population counts by single-race category plus "two or more races" for every U.S. block group.

Published research using ACS data

Recent work pairing ACS demographics with datasets available on Dewey:

• Exploring Dynamic Human Mobility of Diverse Social Groups Under Heat Conditions (Gu et al., 2025). Integrates ACS race, income, and education data with Advan Research data to simulate how different social groups adjust activity during extreme heat.
• Unequal Avoidance: Disparities in Smoke-Induced Out-Migration (Holloway and Rubin, 2022). Combines census demographic data with SafeGraph movement data and satellite smoke plumes to show higher-income and whiter populations out-migrate during smoke events at higher rates.
• Rebuilding for Whom? (UCLA Latino Policy and Politics Institute, 2026). Data brief that draws on census data with RentHub and Dwellsy rental listings to assess tenant equity in post-fire housing recovery in Altadena, CA.
• SAFNet: Multisource Data Fusion for Building Attribute Prediction (Subedi et al., 2025). Fuses census attributes, ATTOM building data, and street-view imagery to predict structural attributes for flood risk assessment.

Project ideas using ACS data

• Real estate and urban economics: pair income brackets with property transactions (ATTOM) to track affordability, displacement, and neighborhood change.
• Labor economics: normalize layoff events (WARN Database) by block-group or county workforce demographics to study who bears job loss.
• Consumer research: test whether market demographics predict adoption of durable goods like home improvement products and electronics (OpenBrand).
• Entrepreneurship and finance: relate demographic and income composition to rates of new business formation (BrightQuery).

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CDC PLACES (ZCTA & Census Tract) tables

The National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, Division of Population Health releases public health data. CDC PLACES (ZCTA & Census Tract) data, the successor to the 500 Cities project, is the standard source for small-area estimates of chronic disease and health behaviors in the U.S. It is widely used in public health, urban planning, and health economics, and the CDC maintains a catalog of studies built on it [2, 3]. Because PLACES is published at the tract and ZCTA level, it joins directly to almost any other place-based dataset.

PLACES provides model-based estimates of roughly 40 health measures, produced by small-area estimation from the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System [2]. 

CDC Tables on Dewey

• PLACES (Census Tract): Modeled prevalence of ~40 chronic disease and health behavior measures per census tract.
• PLACES (ZCTA): The same PLACES measures aggregated to ZIP Code Tabulation Areas.

Published research using CDC PLACES data

Recent work pairing CDC PLACES with datasets available on Dewey:

• Neighborhood Greenspace Visits and Coronary Heart Disease (Mouli et al., 2026). Links tract-level greenspace visitation from Advan Research with CDC PLACES heart disease prevalence across nine U.S. metros, adjusting for NDVI greenness, and finds higher visitation associated with lower CHD prevalence.
• Neighborhood Greenspace Visits and Mental Health (Mouli et al., 2026). Integrates Advan Research greenspace visits with PLACES mental health estimates, ACS demographics, and NDVI across 13,152 tracts; more visits predict better mental health.
• Urban Park Visitation and Physical Chronic Disease Burden (Liu, 2026). A dissertation that combines SafeGraph park visitation with a composite chronic disease burden score built from CDC PLACES across 25 metros.

Project ideas using CDC data

• Healthcare markets: compare negotiated healthcare rates (Serif Health) against the local disease burden they serve.
• Housing and health: relate rental prices and listing dynamics (RentHub) to tract-level chronic disease prevalence.
• Labor and health: examine whether local hiring activity and job posting composition (LinkUp) track community health burden.
• Environmental health: combine the air quality tables (PM2.5, ozone) with climate risk scores (ClimateCheck) to build neighborhood exposure profiles.
• Health economics of consumption: compare spending composition by industry (Consumer Edge) against health outcome prevalence across regions.

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NLR Alternative Fuels Data Center: EV charging and fuel stations

The Alternative Fuels Data Center's Station Locator, maintained since the 1990s by the National Laboratory of the Rockies (formerly NREL; renamed in 2025), is the default source for the location of EV charging and alternative fuel infrastructure in transportation, energy, and urban research [4]. 

NLR AFDC station locator tables on Dewey

• EV Charging & Alternative Fuel Station Locations: Every EV charging and alternative fuel station in the U.S., with location, network, and connector details.

Project ideas using NLR data

• Energy policy and equity: map charging deserts against ACS income and ACS race composition to identify underserved communities.
• Commercial real estate: test whether proximity to charging infrastructure shows up in commercial listing activity and attributes (REsimplifi).
• Retail economics: compare basket composition at convenience stores that host chargers versus those that don't (PDI Technologies), extending published evidence that stations boost nearby spending [5].
• Hospitality and transportation: study visitation patterns at businesses located near charging stations (PassBy).

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More Ways to Explore

These open data sources can also join with each other, unlocking new insights in a wide range of research disciplines:

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Economics and finance: Combine ACS income, and housing market data to study how neighborhood opportunity is priced and who can access it. Or use ACS demographics as a denominator for firm activity, business formation, and labor market measures at any geography.

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Business and marketing: Layer ACS demographics and CDC PLACES into market analysis, site selection, and consumer segmentation research. Or you can study how local infrastructure (NLR stations) and neighborhood characteristics shape retail performance and consumer spending.

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Public policy and urban planning: Stack ACS demographics with ClimateRisk, and Dwellsy to measure which communities bear environmental burdens, and whether housing markets price them in. Or evaluate infrastructure equity by comparing where public investments (EV charging) land relative to income, race, and childhood opportunity.

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What’s Next?

Explore these datasets on Dewey today, and feel free to tell us what data you’d like to see added to the platform: [email protected]

References

1. U.S. Census Bureau. American Community Survey. https://www.census.gov/programs-surveys/acs.html

2. CDC. PLACES: Local Data for Better Health. https://www.cdc.gov/places/

3. CDC. PLACES Publications and Resources. https://www.cdc.gov/places/publications-articles-resources/index.html

4. U.S. Department of Energy, Alternative Fuels Data Center. Alternative Fueling Station Locator. https://afdc.energy.gov/stations

5. Zheng et al. (2024). Effects of electric vehicle charging stations on the economic vitality of local businesses. Nature Communications. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-024-51554-9

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