Lynchburg, Virginia · Pilot City

Mapping the Lasting
Geography of Injustice

1930s HOLC redlining overlaid with health outcomes, food access, environmental burdens, lead pipes, and surveillance infrastructure — making the invisible visible.

Explore the Map Commission an Audit →
12.8yr
Life expectancy gap
Ward II vs Ward III
89/100
Food desert score
Grade D tracts
40%
Flock cameras in
redlined zones
84th
EJScreen national %ile
environmental burden
Interactive Dashboard

Lynchburg, VA — Pilot City

HOLC Redlining EJScreen Flock LPR
BurdenMap GIS — Lynchburg Equity Audit
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Lynchburg, VA — Equity Audit

The interactive GIS dashboard is best experienced full-screen. Tap below to explore redlining, surveillance data, and census overlays.

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Live — 23 census tracts
12 HOLC zones
15 Flock cameras
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Key Findings

What the Data Reveals

12.8yr
Life Expectancy Gap
Ward II residents live nearly 13 fewer years than Ward III on average. The gap follows the 1930s HOLC boundary almost exactly — 90 years later.
82%
of Ward II Was Redlined
82% of Ward II received Grade D ("Hazardous") in the 1930s vs. 4% in Ward III. Today Ward II is 62.8% Black; Ward III 12.4%.
40%
Flock Cameras in Grade D
40% of LPD's 15 Flock license plate readers sit in the highest-redlined tracts — same areas with the lowest income and highest poverty rates.
84th
Environmental Burden Percentile
Ward II ranks 84th nationally for cumulative environmental burden — air toxics, Superfund proximity, and wastewater discharge per EJScreen.
89/100
Food Desert Score
Grade D tracts score 89/100 on the food desert index. Only 28% of residents have grocery access vs. 94% in Grade A areas.
$42K
Income Gap Between Wards
Median income in Ward II is $42,580 below Ward III. Poverty rate: 44.8% in Ward II vs. 8.4% in Ward III — a 36 percentage point gap.
Map Layers

Every Layer Tells Part of the Story

HOLC Redlining Polygons
1930s federal grade boundaries showing which neighborhoods were locked out of homeownership.
Historical
Census Heat Maps
Income, homeownership, poverty, race, and life expectancy by census tract — heat-mapped against HOLC grades.
ACS 5-Year
Environmental Justice
Air toxics, Superfund proximity, wastewater discharge from EPA EJScreen — mirrored after federal data removal Feb 2025.
Mirrored
Food Deserts & Lead Pipes
USDA food atlas + WVWA lead service line inventory. Block-level grocery access and lead pipe risk mapping.
USDA + WVWA
Flock LPR Cameras
All 15 LPD Flock Safety license plate reader locations from public records, mapped against HOLC grade zones.
Public Records
Ward Comparison Tool
Select any two wards, compare 14 equity metrics side by side, and export a full PDF audit report with citations.
Built-in Tool
About

Redlining Ended. Its Effects Did Not.

BurdenMap is a national civic GIS platform documenting how historical federal policy continues to shape health outcomes, environmental exposure, food access, and policing patterns across American cities. Lynchburg, Virginia is our pilot city.

Between 1935 and 1940, federal HOLC appraisers graded Lynchburg neighborhoods A through D. Grade D areas — labeled "Hazardous" — were predominantly Black. Those boundaries still predict where people get sick, go hungry, breathe polluted air, and are surveilled today.

We use open-source GIS tools, public records, and community input to produce independent equity audits — making spatial data accessible to journalists, advocates, researchers, and residents.

"Where you live should not determine how long you live — but in Lynchburg, it does."
Data Sources

Built on Public Records

Historical
HOLC Redlining Maps
1930s Home Owners' Loan Corporation grade polygons, Lynchburg metro region.
Census
ACS 5-Year Estimates
Income, homeownership, poverty, race, life expectancy — 23 Lynchburg census tracts.
Environmental
EJScreen v2.3 (PEDP Mirror)
EPA EJ data mirrored after federal removal.
Removed from EPA.gov Feb 2025
Food Access
USDA Food Access Atlas
Grocery access and food desert designations by census tract across Lynchburg.
Infrastructure
WVWA Lead Inventory
Western Virginia Water Authority lead service line inventory — block-level risk.
Surveillance
Flock LPR Public Records
15 Flock Safety camera locations from Lynchburg PD public records requests.
Boundaries
Lynchburg ArcGIS API
Live ward and census tract boundaries from the City of Lynchburg GIS open data portal.
Methodology
Mapping Inequality
Robert K. Nelson et al., Mapping Inequality: Redlining in New Deal America, 2023.