Mapping Detroit: Analyzing Detroit's voting geography

Voting in Detroit is not known to be easy and the numbers of voters reflect that difficulty. Election Day confusion is well-known and documented even amongst regular voters. Polling places have changed and in some cases changed again.

In 2020, the City Clerk noted that some 40,000 Detroiters were subject to a polling place update two weeks prior to the election. A result of the 2024 statewide redistricting led to some 300,000 Detroiters facing new polling places along with their new represented districts in the State House and State Senate.

As the map shows, the geography of voting in Detroit is far from being cleared up. The lines represent how far flung some Detroiters are from their polling place, in some cases more than 3 miles away. Detroiters in many cases will be traveling past multiple other polling places before reaching their assigned polling place. Other polling places look like a star because Detroiters are being assigned in every direction to come vote there.

Among the oddest polling place assignments is that of Sampson Academy where Detroiters may pass three to seven different polling places before reaching their assigned polling place at Sampson Academy.

Bethany Lutheran is a great example of the star pattern of polling place assignments. Oddly, another polling place is right across the street at Ronald Brown Academy. Detroiters come from all cardinal directions to vote.
  
The last example is a little bit of both where Detroiters in the same precinct as Mason School get to vote there, but then a random set of other precincts must vote there as well. The presence of Farwell Rec Center right next to Mason School represents the crisscrossing and confusing polling place geographies.

This is part of a series from the unofficial cartographer of Detroit, Alex B. Hill, a self-described “data nerd and anthropologist” who combines mapping, data, and analytics with storytelling and human experience. He is the founder of DETROITography and author of “Detroit in 50 Maps" and “Great Lakes in 50 Maps.”