Henrico residents staying away from work and at home at same rate as Virginians overall

Henrico citizens have been staying away from work and staying at home during the past six weeks at the same rate as Virginians overall, according to mobility data compiled by Google.

The data, collected from the devices of Google users in an anonymous format, shows that between March 28 and May 9, Henrico residents on average stayed home 10 percent more often than they had between Jan. 3 and Feb. 6 and visited places of work 28 percent less often. Both numbers were identical for Virginians overall and very similar to the numbers for Americans in general (who visited work 26 percent less often and stayed home 9 percent more often).

Henricoans also visited retail and recreation sites 33 percent less often (the state average was a 32-percent drop); transit stations 55 percent less often (the state average was a 36-percent decline) and went shopping at grocery stores and pharmacies just 1 percent more often (the state average was 4 percent).

But if they’ve been exercising outdoors, it hasn’t been at parks. Henrico residents spent 24 percent less time at parks during the recent six-week period when compared with the four-week period earlier in the year. Statewide, Virginians have visited parks 8 percent more often and Americans in general 9 percent more, the statistics show.

Chesterfield residents, conversely, have been flocking to parks – visiting them 37 percent more often than earlier in the year, according to the data. Richmond residents have done so 30 percent more often.

The percentages reflect a day-by-day comparison between the number of visits to, and length of stays at, sites within each group of locations during the most recent six-week period and the median value for the corresponding days of the week from the previous time frame.

Google collected the data from users who have turned on the “Location History” setting on their Google Accounts on internet-connected devices, according to the company. (The history is set to “off” by default.)

“No personally identifiable information, like an individual’s location, contacts or movement, is made available at any point,” company officials wrote in a statement. “People who have Location History turned on can choose to turn it off at any time from their Google Account and can always delete Location History data directly from their Timeline.”

The data, Google officials wrote, may or may not represent the behavior of a larger population.

Among other Richmond-area localities, only residents of Richmond (30 percent) have stayed away from work more than Henricoans, when compared with the Jan. 3 to Feb. 6 time frame, and only Hanover residents (10 percent) have been home as much as their Henrico counterparts.