Dogs of New York, Shapes and Sizes Edition

My recent Dogs of New York, post got circulated a little. On Friday I got a very nice note from William Kornblum, an urban and community studies sociologist who these days is emeritus at CUNY. In the 1980s, Bill studied the people who use Central Park and wrote a report for the Central Park Conservancy. Some of that work counted dog-walkers. He reminded me that parks in New York City see a lot of dogs. NYC Parks estimates about 1.5 million canine visits to Central Park each year. That is about 4,100 visits a day, to one park. He also asked: Is there a size gradient perhaps? Larger dogs out on the periphery where there is more room? Smaller dogs in the dense apartment neighborhoods? This is a good question; one the data I have can almost answer. The main problem is that the license data contained in nycdogs do not record the size or weight of any particular dog. Licenses do record the breed that the owner reports (though, as we saw before the modal breed reported is “Unknown”). But…