The City of Danville’s Information Technology Department, in collaboration with the Community Development Department’s Division of Housing & Development, has created an interactive “story map” that provides a comprehensive view of Danville’s housing landscape.
Called the “Housing Navigator,” the map includes information on housing demand and sales, available parcels for development, revitalization efforts, and services. Data is updated on a regular basis.
The site was designed by Brady Walker, a GIS specialist in the Information Technology Department.
“Interest in the city’s housing situation has grown exponentially, yet vital information has been spread across disparate sources,” said Walker, noting that a housing strategy report in 2022 underscored the need for hundreds of new single-family homes and thousands of apartments to accommodate both pent-up and future housing demands. “Our goal for the Housing Navigator was to create a repository of housing resources that empowers residents, businesses, and developers with the prudent information to make informed decisions toward meeting those demands.”
Susan McCulloch, division director for Housing & Development, said the story map is an innovative way to reach out to residents and developers.
"The Housing Navigator showcases services, resources, and development needs in an easy-to-navigate format with interesting charts and interactive features,” she said. “What a great project and idea to inform the community and entice residential developers to Danville."
This new application walks users through these main areas of interest:
- Community profile
- Basic info about the city, employment statistics, and industry sectors.
- Housing needs
- Provides information on projected job growth, population, and their effect on housing.
- New housing permits
- Showcasing new building permits for both single-family and multifamily housing.
- Current projects
- Highlighting housing projects that are currently underway in the city.
- Real estate sales dashboard
- Interactive map and dashboard that shows all valid residential transactions from July 1, 2020, with data updated regularly.
- Emergency housing services
- Providing descriptions and links to accessing the city’s emergency housing resources.
- Low Income
- Information on resources available for the City’s low-income citizens.
- Revitalize
- Links and descriptions of the area’s significant, innovative efforts to revitalize the City and County.
- Housing summit
- Links to the most recent Southern Virginia Regional Housing Summit in PDF format, as well as the full video of the presentation.
- Explore available sites
- An interactive map to discover sites throughout the city that are suitable for new housing development.