Data Center

The Kern Council of Governments, through an agreement with the California State Department of Finance, Demographic Research Unit, functions as the Affiliate State Census Data Center for the Kern region. Kern COG maintains a repository for current and past Census data. The executive director acts as the Census Bureau’s “key person” for Census-related activity. Kern COG is also the official source of demographic data for the County of Kern and its various departments.

Information is displayed on the Kern COG web site, and staff responds to more than 1,500 inquiries annually for Census and other information from private businesses, other government agencies and the general public. While many of these requests are routine, such as county population numbers, others involve detailed analysis of existing data and require extensive data compilation and mapping.

Kern COG staff also produces detailed maps that include Census data layers used for regional demographic analysis.

All documents in PDF format unless noted

Kern GEONET

Since the mid-1990s, Kern COG has assisted local agencies in developing their GIS infrastructure. These systems are vital to the decision making that local governments carry out in their programs every day. Eighty percent of all local government data could be maintained more accurately and displayed more meaningfully through GIS. Local governments using GIS benefit from better decisions provided by the information available on these maps. The Kern Geographic Information Network (Kern GEONET) is a consortium of local governments administered by Kern COG. GEONET coordinates GIS development locally, saving cities more than $2 million from the joint purchase digital aerial imagery and creation of other data layers.

Kern COG has signed long-term agreements with some local government agencies to assist them in developing and maintaining their GIS. These custom agreements provide expertise and stability for smaller agencies more vulnerable to staff turnover. The GIS Incubator program assumes that as local agencies grow, they will be weaned off the need for Kern COG’s assistance. Maricopa, Wasco, Shafter, Kern County Community Development Department, Bakersfield Economic Development Department, Kern County Community Development Department and the Eastern Kern County Resource Conservation District are a few of the agencies that Kern COG has assisted with developing GIS. Kern COG also helps develop standards to increase data sharing benefits and publish data on the Internet to reduce public inquiries for data.

For more information contact Michael Heimer or Ben Raymond.

Regional Traffic Count Data

Interactive transportation maps showing thousands of traffic counts on local roads throughout the Kern Region from the 1990’s to today. The traffic count map includes forecasted traffic growth from the Kern COG regional travel model. To forecast total volume of a road segment, we recommend using the forecasted growth increment from the model and adding it to the most recent traffic count for a road segment. For guidelines on use of the Kern COG regional travel model go to the Transportation Model Documentation . For socio-economic data used in the travel model go to Maps and Data .

• • Kern County Traffic Count Map – Regularly observed traffic counts for over a thousand locations

• • State Highway Traffic Counts – Annual traffic count data published by Caltrans for state routes

• • Kern County Bicycle and Pedestrian Count Map – Regularly observed bike and pedestrian count locations

Regional Transportation Monitoring Improvement Plan

Traffic Count Program MOU