By Sara Kidd, GIS, Data, and Analytics Manager
In honor of Veterans Day, HRPDC staff has updated the November 2020 Map of the Month which showed where veterans live in Hampton Roads. The updated map is featured in a dashboard layout where additional statistics about this important demographic in the region can be viewed.
In 2023, Hampton Roads was home to an estimated 191,400 veterans, comprising approximately 15% of the regional population over 18 years old. This percentage decreased from 16.4% five years ago. The Virginia Beach-Chesapeake-Norfolk, VA-NC metropolitan statistical area (MSA) still has the highest percentage of veterans compared to other MSAs that are over 1,000,000 in population. The other metro areas also saw a decrease in the percentage of veterans in their regions.
| Top Five MSAs (over 1,000,000) | Percent Veterans(2018 Estimate) | Percent Veterans (2023 Estimate) |
1 | Virginia Beach-Chesapeake-Norfolk, VA-NC Metro Area | 16.4% | 15% |
2 | Jacksonville, FL Metro Area | 12.5% | 11.2% |
3 | San Antonio-New Braunfels, TX Metro Area | 11.1% | 10.2% |
4 | Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater, FL Metro Area | 10.1% | 8.6% |
5 | Oklahoma City, OK Metro Area | 9.2% | 8.4 |
The map shows the percentage of the adult population (over 18 years) that are veterans in each census tract. The average across the tracts is 14.5%. The blue tracts have a higher percentage of veterans than the average while the red tracts have a lower percentage of veterans than average across the region.
Several charts on the dashboard provide information about either a selected census tract or for a locality. Information such as age, race, educational attainment, period of service, median income, and more is available for viewing. Click on the map or use the locality filter to drill down to the area of interest.
Click to view in a new window.
The source of the data is the 2019-2023 US Census American Community Survey (ACS) 5-Year Estimates.