The PLACES Project is an expansion of the original 500 Cities Project that began in 2015. The original project was launched by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in partnership with the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) and CDC Foundation. In 2018, this partnership was extended through 2020. In 2020, the project expanded to provide small area estimates (SAE) for counties, places, census tracts, and ZIP Code Tabulation Areas (ZCTA) across the entire United States.
PLACES provides data for all counties, incorporated and census-designated places, census tracts, and ZIP code Tabulation Areas (ZCTAs) across the United States. Model based small area estimation methods are used to estimate 27 health measures, including unhealthy behaviors (e.g., current smoking), health outcomes (e.g., coronary heart disease, diabetes), and prevention practices (e.g., health insurance coverage, cholesterol screening). These estimates are available through a public, interactive PLACES website that allows users to view, explore, and download county-, place-, tract-, and ZCTA-level data for all populated areas in the United States.
