Mapping Banks & Barriers
Where can Charlotte residents actually reach a bank, and who is left relying on payday lenders and check cashers?
- Data
- 350+ banks, credit unions, and financial institutions; FFIEC and U.S. Census tract data; resident surveys
- Analysis
- Placed every institution on its census tract, classified tracts as low, moderate, or upper income using FFIEC standards, then compared access across income levels and paired it with what residents told me
- Impact
- Youth Speaker at Esri UC 2025. Covered by Bloomberg, with two reporters flying in from New York for a neighborhood tour
Key findingWhere Charlotte residents live largely decides whether they can reach a bank. In lower-income Crescent neighborhoods like Dalton Village and Pinecrest, residents had fewer than two institutions nearby, and some census tracts had none. In higher-income Fairmeadows in South Charlotte, residents had six or more. That gap helps explain why many Crescent residents rely on payday lenders and check cashers instead of banks.