Where to go for more precise/detailed census (especially density) information? (homes, calculating)

[OyCrumbler]

The US census seems to count park areas and other public spaces when calculating its densities, and that's fine and all, but I would like to see the density in areas where there is more of a permanent population (my apologies to the vagrants in SF; I'm sure the parks are perfectly great homes (before anyone jumps on this, I love San Francisco)). For cities like NYC, where a good fifth of the city is parkland, and a good deal more of it is public/pseudopublic spaces, these statistics can skew things quite a bit when comparing it to cities a little less endowed with greenery. So what I'm really trying to get to is the density of cities when we're talking about residential and mixed-use areas--and if the stats split even more hairs, then so much the better.

So, any references? I'd be much obliged.

[lammius]

Get a geographic information systems application (ESRI's ArcMap, for example), download Census Bureau's Census Blocks 2000 shapefile. Create an .mxd map, add the census data to the map, select the Census blocks you want to count, sum their population, sum their area, divide, boom. If you don't have a mapping application, download the shapefile anyway, use the shapefile's .dbf database file in Excel to do the same exercise (though you must know the FIPS code for each census block you want to select).

[OyCrumbler]

Sorry, I guess I should mention that I know I can do that already; it'd just be easier if someone actually tabulated this for all the major cities already, and I can just reference that instead. But if not, then I guess I have a pet project to work on.