What do we mean by a neighborhood?
NeighborhoodScout® uses the official government designation for neighborhoods - the census tract.
Census tracts are small, relatively permanent subdivisions of a county that are defined by the U.S. Census Bureau in conjunction with local authorities all across the country to define real neighborhoods that are bounded to contain areas with homogeneous population characteristics (including economic status, lifestyle, and living conditions). Census tracts usually have 4,000 persons, but can range between 1,500 and 8,000 persons. This is the most fine-grained area for which detailed information is made available from the government, to protect the individual privacy of each of us. Because census tracts are based on population, they vary in size depending on the density of settlement. In urban areas, they are small, and in rural areas they can cover an entire small town or even a few small towns in very rural areas.
Since census tracts are subdivisions of a county, we did a spatial overlay of the census tracts onto city and town boundaries using a geographic information system to properly assign each census tract to its appropriate city or town. Then we named each census tract to the local colloquially recognized neighborhood name for that spot (e.g., Boston, MA (Dorchester). If there was not a name available, we named the census tract by the largest street intersection in the census tract (e.g., Worcester, MA (Lincoln St/Plantation St)
Why we don't use Zip Codes as neighborhoods
Zip codes were developed by the Postal Service for the purpose of delivering mail, but were never intended to define coherent neighborhoods. In addition, Zip Codes can have as many as 10 distinctly different census tracts contained within them. When distinct census tracts are blended together in a single Zip Code, the data reflects their average conditions and often gives a false sense of the area. The result is that potentially great matching neighborhoods can be missed, and erroneous matches can also be produced and delivered to you.
Using census tracts makes great matches possible, and helps people find the areas that are best for them and their families. Because we are committed to providing the highest possible quality and finding the neighborhoods that best meet your criteria, we use census tracts. And, as always, we show you the actual street map of the neighborhood so you know exactly where your best matching neighborhood is located.
What is a Condition Alert?
A condition alert is a condition in the neighborhood that triggers an alert. NeighborhoodScout contains condition alerts to highlight conditions that are extreme, whether good or bad. This helps answer crucial questions about the state of the neighborhood being evaluated, such as:
What are the risks of violent crime here?
Is the risk of home break-ins or other property crimes increasing?
Does real estate here hold its value?
Are the trends in local vacancies or unemployment concerning?
...and dozens more.
Information at a glance that you need to know to invest, appraise or finance a property.
Weeks Field median real estate price is $308,890, which is less expensive than 70.3% of Alaska neighborhoods and 56.3% of all U.S. neighborhoods.
The average rental price in Weeks Field is currently $1,967, based on NeighborhoodScout's exclusive analysis. The average rental cost in this neighborhood is higher than 61.7% of the neighborhoods in Alaska.
Weeks Field is a suburban neighborhood (based on population density) located in Fairbanks, Alaska.
Weeks Field real estate is primarily made up of small (studio to two bedroom) to medium sized (three or four bedroom) small apartment buildings and single-family homes. Most of the residential real estate is occupied by a mixture of owners and renters. Many of the residences in the Weeks Field neighborhood are older, well-established, built between 1940 and 1969. A number of residences were also built between 1970 and 1999.
Weeks Field has a 12.9% vacancy rate, which is well above average compared to other U.S. neighborhoods (higher than 72.2% of American neighborhoods). Most vacant housing here is vacant year round. This could either signal that there is a weak demand for real estate in the neighborhood or that large amount of new housing has been built and not yet occupied. Either way, if you live here, you may find many of the homes or apartments are empty.
Notable & Unique Neighborhood Characteristics
Many things matter about a neighborhood, but the first thing most people notice is the way a neighborhood looks and its particular character. For example, one might notice whether the buildings all date from a certain time period or whether shop signs are in multiple languages. This particular neighborhood in Fairbanks, the Weeks Field neighborhood, has some outstanding things about the way it looks and its way of life that are worth highlighting.
People
Of particular note, 6.8% of the people in the Weeks Field neighborhood currently reside in a correction facility, held due to punishment for a crime.
Occupations
It used to be that most Americans lived on the farm, or otherwise made their living from the land, the forests, or the sea. With global trade and an economy increasingly based on providing services to one another, fewer people farm, fish or harvest timber now than at any time in American history. But according to NeighborhoodScout's leading analysis, the Weeks Field neighborhood stands apart from most American neighborhood due to the proportion of its residents still working in these fields. With 6.5% of the workforce so employed, this neighborhood has a greater concentration of such workers than 97.9% of U.S. neighborhoods.
Furthermore, with 2.0% of employed workers living in the Weeks Field neighborhood active in the military, this neighborhood has the distinction of having a higher proportion of people in the military than 96.2% of American neighborhoods. This is a major shaper of the neighborhood's culture and character.
Length of Commute
Whether walking, biking, riding, or driving, the length of one's commute is an important factor for one's quality of life. The Weeks Field neighborhood stands out for its commute length, according to NeighborhoodScout's analysis. Residents of the Weeks Field neighborhood have the pleasure of having one of the shortest commutes to work of any neighborhood in America. 63.8% of the residents have a commute time from home to work (one way) of less than fifteen minutes. This is a higher proportion of residents enjoying a short trip to work than NeighborhoodScout found in 97.2% of U.S. neighborhoods. Less time commuting means more time for other things in life.
Real Estate
Three-deckers, duplexes, old Victorian homes cut up into apartments. Independent stores on the corner selling pizza. These are some of the hallmarks of neighborhoods with lots of small 2, 3, and 4 unit apartment buildings. The Weeks Field neighborhood really stands out in this regard, however, as it is dominated by such small apartment buildings more than nearly any other neighborhood in America. This is a stunning visual and lifestyle example of this type of neighborhood. In fact, 37.7% of the real estate here are small 2, 3, or 4 unit apartment buildings, which is a higher proportion than found in 96.7% of America's neighborhoods.
Diversity
Did you know that the Weeks Field neighborhood has more Native American and Canadian ancestry people living in it than nearly any neighborhood in America? It's true! In fact, 11.2% of this neighborhood's residents have Native American ancestry and 1.4% have Canadian ancestry.
Weeks Field is also pretty special linguistically. Significantly, 5.4% of its residents five years old and above primarily speak Native American languages at home. While this may seem like a small percentage, it is higher than 99.7% of the neighborhoods in America.
The Neighbors
There are two complementary measures for understanding the income of a neighborhood's residents: the average and the extremes. While a neighborhood may be relatively wealthy overall, it is equally important to understand the rate of people - particularly children - who are living at or below the federal poverty line, which is extremely low income. Some neighborhoods with a lower average income may actually have a lower childhood poverty rate than another with a higher average income, and this helps us understand the conditions and character of a neighborhood.
The neighbors in the Weeks Field neighborhood in Fairbanks are upper-middle income, making it an above average income neighborhood. NeighborhoodScout's exclusive analysis reveals that this neighborhood has a higher income than 71.2% of the neighborhoods in America. In addition, 6.6% of the children seventeen and under living in this neighborhood are living below the federal poverty line, which is a lower rate of childhood poverty than is found in 59.7% of America's neighborhoods.
The old saying "you are what you eat" is true. But it is also true that you are what you do for a living. The types of occupations your neighbors have shape their character, and together as a group, their collective occupations shape the culture of a place.
In the Weeks Field neighborhood, 40.7% of the working population is employed in executive, management, and professional occupations. The second most important occupational group in this neighborhood is sales and service jobs, from major sales accounts, to working in fast food restaurants, with 22.4% of the residents employed. Other residents here are employed in clerical, assistant, and tech support occupations (15.5%), and 14.9% in manufacturing and laborer occupations.
Languages
The languages spoken by people in this neighborhood are diverse. These are tabulated as the languages people preferentially speak when they are at home with their families. The most common language spoken in the Weeks Field neighborhood is English, spoken by 84.1% of households. Other important languages spoken here include Spanish, Native American languages, Korean and Tagalog (the first language of the Philippine region).
Ethnicity / Ancestry
Culture is the shared learned behavior of peoples. Undeniably, different ethnicities and ancestries have different cultural traditions, and as a result, neighborhoods with concentrations of residents of one or another ethnicities or ancestries will express those cultures. It is what makes the North End in Boston so fun to visit for the Italian restaurants, bakeries, culture, and charm, and similarly, why people enjoy visiting Chinatown in San Francisco.
In the Weeks Field neighborhood in Fairbanks, AK, residents most commonly identify their ethnicity or ancestry as German (12.2%). There are also a number of people of Irish ancestry (11.8%), and residents who report Native American roots (11.2%), and some of the residents are also of Asian ancestry (7.0%), along with some Mexican ancestry residents (5.6%), among others. In addition, 10.0% of the residents of this neighborhood were born in another country.
Getting to Work
Even if your neighborhood is walkable, you may still have to drive to your place of work. Some neighborhoods are located where many can get to work in just a few minutes, while others are located such that most residents have a long and arduous commute. The greatest number of commuters in Weeks Field neighborhood spend under 15 minutes commuting one-way to work (63.8% of working residents), one of the shortest commutes across America.
Here most residents (78.3%) drive alone in a private automobile to get to work. In addition, quite a number also carpool with coworkers, friends, or neighbors to get to work (13.5%) . In a neighborhood like this, as in most of the nation, many residents find owning a car useful for getting to work.
SCOUT’s patented match algorithm identifies the most similar neighborhoods to a subject location, and quantifies the similarity to the subject location. This allows analysts to identify the most similar neighborhoods in a local market area for appraisals, investments, and research.
The algorithm uses 273 neighborhood conditions, identifies the dominant dimensions underlying the conditions and calculates the similarity. This captures the true culture and character of locations, economic conditions, and trends.
The closer to 100% means the locations are nearly identical. 80% is a very good, but not excellent match, and so forth.
