Welcome to
HR&A Labs
We’re driving the future of data innovation and insights. Our digital products combine rigorous data analysis with smart design—giving cities the right tools to solve their most pressing challenges.
Cities are generating more data than ever, but data alone doesn’t solve problems. HR&A Labs helps clients turn that data into solutions, sourcing new inputs to extend a project’s reach and unlocking deeper insights from what already exists.
Part innovation studio, part solutions provider, HR&A Labs shapes, builds, and deploys digital products that embed rigorous data analysis and data science into our work. We draw on HR&A’s strategic expertise to deliver tools that turn complexity into clarity — and analysis into action.
Our Solutions
Projects
We create custom data solutions for clients who are working to tackle everything from the housing crisis to access to affordable high-speed internet. Our tools help provide clarity around the issues that matter for the communities they serve.
HR&A collaborated with Brookings Metro, Gensler, and Cara Eckholm Studio to develop a comprehensive study on office-to-residential conversions across six U.S. cities for the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). This research provides cities with actionable strategies to address housing shortages, repurpose distressed office markets, and revitalize downtowns through data-driven conversion approaches.
HR&A has guided Wake County's affordable housing strategy since 2017, supporting creation of a $61.6 million preservation fund, implementing the Affordable Housing Development Program providing gap financing, and designing the House Wake! Eviction Prevention Program helping over 3,000 households remain in their homes. Our sustained partnership positioned the County to deploy strategic funding interventions addressing preservation, production, and housing stability.
Rhode Island's 39 municipalities maintained land use data in vastly different formats, preventing statewide analysis and coordinated planning. HR&A partnered with the Rhode Island Division of Statewide Planning and Go Consulting Services to standardize zoning, current land use, and future land use datasets, creating unified GIS data and interactive visualization tools that enable data-driven planning for growth and conservation through 2050.
HR&A worked with the Maine Governor’s Office of Policy Innovation to develop a study to understand housing needs and deficits along with their impacts on Maine’s economy. Our study found that 76,400–84,300 new homes need to be built within the next 7 years to maintain Maine’s economic growth.
HR&A collaborated with the Texas Broadband Development Office (BDO) to develop the State’s first ever comprehensive statewide Digital Opportunity Plan, establishing their roadmap to universal broadband availability, affordability, and adoption.
News & Insights
