Have you ever come across a group of rats carrying bits and pieces of leftover food while scurrying across the empty pavement on your way home? As New Yorkers, most of us have had a fair share of unexpected run-ins and incidents with rats. It is widely known that rats are rampant in the city and they live among us, taking refuge and shelter on the streets, and even sometimes in our homes. Rats thrive in the city due to an abundance of leftover waste food piling up along the streets outside food establishments and buildings.<\/p>\n
An estimate of about 250,000 to millions of rats<\/a> lived in the city in 2017. To put these numbers into perspective, New York City’s rats is equal to approximately 20% of the human population. The high number of rat populations in NYC poses a threat to humans. For being notorious for carrying diseases, these NYC rats certainly are a public nuisance. Over the years from 2014 to 2017, we saw an incremental increase in rodent complaints. Last year, we saw a total of 19,152 rodent complaints<\/strong>. That\u2019s an increase of about 10%<\/strong> from 2016. In the first quarter of 2018, there were already 4,831 complaints made to the city about rodent sightings. Fret not, here at RentHop, we\u2019ve collected a subset of data from 2014 to 2017 of rodent complaints made to NYC\u2019s 311<\/a>. We wanted to investigate the behaviors of rats based on the locations of rat sightings and tell you which neighborhoods have the most rodent complaints and which is the season when rodent complaints start ramping up in NYC. <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Among these boroughs, Brooklyn has the greatest number of total rodent complaints, followed by Manhattan and then the Bronx. However, this comparison does not consider the land size of each borough. By calculating the number of rodent complaints per square mile, the story changes.<\/p>\n Comparing 311 Rodent Complaints in 2017 by Borough<\/strong><\/p>\n Rodent complaints in 2017 by borough sorted in descending order according to complaints per square mile.<\/em><\/p>\n While Brooklyn has the greatest number of rodent complaints among the boroughs, Manhattan actually leads the number of rodent complaints per square mile among all 5 boroughs in New York City. As for Queens, the largest borough in New York City, the number of complaints per square mile is actually low for its land size. Among smaller boroughs such as the Bronx and Staten Island, with the Bronx being slightly larger, we see that the Bronx has more complaints per square mile.<\/p>\n Now that we have a better sense of the number of rat complaints among these boroughs, we can explore how the rodent complaints vary by neighborhoods. We\u2019ve looked at the most recent data from 2017 and created an interactive map to visualize the trends by first geocoding the exact longitudes and latitudes of the incidents to their respective neighborhoods. <\/p>\n NYC Rodent Complaints 2017 Interactive Visualization by Neighborhoods (With Median Rents)<\/strong><\/p>\n
\n <\/p>\nHere are the key findings from the study:<\/strong><\/h5>\n
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New York City Rodent Complaints by Neighborhoods, 2017<\/strong><\/h5>\n
\nTo begin, we looked at the rodent complaints data for each of the boroughs in New York City. Below you can see the total number of complaints in each borough in 2017. Rodent complaints consist of primarily rat sightings.<\/p>\n<\/a>Figure 1<\/strong><\/h5>\n
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\n Borough<\/th>\n Number of Complaints<\/th>\n Complaints Per SqMile<\/th>\n<\/tr>\n \n Manhattan<\/td>\n 4,507<\/td>\n 197.50<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Brooklyn<\/td>\n 7,253<\/td>\n 104.35<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Bronx<\/td>\n 3,746<\/td>\n 88.20<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Queens<\/td>\n 2,862<\/td>\n 26.47<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Staten Island<\/td>\n 784<\/td>\n 13.35<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n
\n <\/p>\nThe Concentration of Rodent Complaints in NYC<\/strong><\/h5>\n
<\/a>Figure 2<\/strong><\/h5>\n