Move-Smart is a data-driven decision support tool designed to help potential movers identify U.S. metro and micro areas that align with their preferences. MoveSmart analyzes many economic, social, and environmental indicators across U.S. metropolitan areas — then matches you to places that align with what you actually value.
We pull from six public datasets, engineer standardized CBSA features, and surface cities that match your preferences.
We aggregate indicators from the Census Bureau, FBI crime statistics, CDC health data, NOAA climate records, EPA walkability scores, and open text from Wikivoyage and Wikipedia for semantic city context.
Raw variables are standardized into feature scores, then combined into interpretable CBSA dimensions used by the recommender.
PCA + K-Means clustering reveals natural city archetypes — structural similarities that group metros into meaningful, interpretable clusters.
You set 0–5 priorities across 10 dimensions. We rank cities by profile similarity, then blend optional semantic-search text matching.
An LLM reads your top matches and generates natural-language explanations — highlighting why each city fits your specific priorities.
Each metro gets 0–5 scores across affordability, jobs, safety, education, health, walkability, diversity, urban form, warmth, and climate mildness.
How far does your dollar go? We score affordability by comparing typical housing costs and rents against local income levels.
Per-capita crime rates normalized for population density. Both violent and property crime contribute to the overall safety score.
Opportunity and momentum. We combine labor market strength with recent growth signals to reflect how supportive a metro is for careers.
A simple measure of educational attainment — useful as a proxy for workforce skill mix and long-run economic resilience.
A composite view of community health built from population-level rates across chronic conditions and behavior risk factors.
How easy is it to get around on foot? We use a standardized national index that reflects access to destinations and transit-supportive design.
A quantified diversity index derived from Census race composition at the metro level.
How dense, walkable, and connected is the city? Urban form shapes daily life — from your commute to spontaneous street-level encounters.
A straightforward warmth score that captures typical year-round temperatures for the metro.
A comfort score for “how extreme” the weather feels — balancing swings across seasons plus precipitation and snow.
K-Means (K=5) cluster groups the metro/micro areas into five archetypes based on the models numericals features.
Higher housing costs with older-leaning populations and steady growth.
Colder, more seasonal metros with stronger manufacturing footprints.
Dense, high-amenity urban metros with elevated housing costs.
Metros with higher hardship and weaker health outcomes vs. national baseline.
Younger, work-first metros with higher growth volatility and safety trade-offs.
In the app, each city card includes an LLM-batched “About this metro” summary, built from open Wikivoyage and Wikipedia text to provide a quick, readable overview.
You can also click Why this city? to generate a personalized explanation. The model uses your 0–5 slider priorities, optional keywords, the city's 10 theme scores, and the metro summary to highlight key matches and honest trade-offs in 2–3 sentences.
Every indicator traces back to a primary government or research source — no proprietary black boxes.
Every CBSA receives standardized feature scores with 10 user-facing dimensions used by the recommendation engine.
PCA dimensionality reduction followed by K-Means clustering groups metros into interpretable archetypes with dominant thematic signatures.
Preference sliders become a 0–5 profile. Cities are ranked by similarity and optionally blended with semantic-search match scores from city summaries.
A large language model generates personalized natural-language summaries explaining why each recommended city aligns with your stated priorities.
A Streamlit application connects everything — preference controls, cluster visualizations, ranked recommendations, and AI-generated explanations in one place.
Open the interactive dashboard, dial in your priorities, and explore personalized city recommendations backed by real data.
Launch MoveSmart Dashboard