Obesity Linked to Urban Sprawl

[Southpaw Bookworm]

Is suburban life making people overweight? Or could it be that overweight people tend to choose the suburban life?

In a study recently published in the Journal of Regional Science, researchers from Oregon State University found that the relationship between obesity and urban sprawl may be a two-way street.

Economists Andrew Plantinga from OSU's Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics and Stephanie Bernell from OSU's Department of Public Health expanded previous studies that showed that people living in areas of urban sprawl tend to have higher body mass indices. Their analysis suggests that the relationship between obesity and urban sprawl may be due to personal preferences when choosing a home location rather than to direct impacts of the suburban environment on physical activity and weight.

Location, location, location. Research by Plantinga and Bernell suggests that an individual's body weight is a factor determining the desirability of a residential location. They found the relationship between obesity and urban sprawl can be explained by the way people sort themselves by personal preference.

Get the rest of the story, and a link to the full report at:
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/medicalnews.php?newsid=30461&nfid=rssfeeds

And if you haven't read it already, go find Last Child in the Woods, which has a lot to say on this topic.

[NNadir]

1. This is very believable.

If you live in the suburbs you spend a fair portion of your day commuting. Hence you have less time for exercise.

As a fat person who has occassionally managed to control his weight I know exercise is the key.

[MountainLaurel]

2. Another related issue is design

Most suburbs were deliberately designed without sidewalks. Part of it was the time: Everyone wanted to support the burgeoning car culture. Part of it was the usual bigotry: trying to keep out "undesirables" who were perceived as being more likely to be on foot.

I grew up walking almost everywhere, even in college. (On-campus parking was at a premium, and my car was usually in the shop.) After I moved to the DC suburbs in VA, I found it nearly impossible to run even minor errands on foot. Many roads (and even some streets in this area can be four lanes and see traffic moving at 55 mph) did not have crosswalks, stoplights with walk signals, and sidewalks. Even to get to a local walking trail, my roommate and I would end up walking along the berm of a six-lane highway.

Our neighborhood had a huge problem with pedestrian fatalities: I'd say someone got hit once a week, with a few fatalities each year. There was a large population of immigrants from small villages in countries where few cars traveled that fast, and all traffic would stop if a pedestrian entered the road. They didn't understand the concept of a crosswalk, and even if they did, many of the areas where the immigrants live have none, or they are 1/2 mile apart. The county's solution in most areas was to install 6-foot-high fences alongside the road to funnel pedestrians to the existing crosswalks.

Another issue, particularly for children, is the dreaded homeowner's association. In many neighborhoods, you can be fined for having a basketball hoop in your driveway. For me growing up, there was always a pickup basketball game going on, which later in the evening would turn into a neighborhood-wide game of hide and seek. Here, that'll get the police called in a heartbeat. As the book Southpaw mentioned will tell you (recently finished it based on a recommendation I saw on DU), some neighborhoods that advertise themselves as having lots of woods have actually made those natural areas off limits to kids because they were *gasp* playing in them, and the liability to the HOA was considered too great.

[NNadir]

3. Good points. We just had sidewalks built on our block.

We live down the street from the High School. Merrill Lynch put up a huge facility (of the typical type) and the town was embarrassed to putting sidewalks on our block because of the school.

I have always been fond of bicycling and walking and in fact once had a one man revolution against the internal combustion engine - but that was in LA in the 1970s.

The side walk has improved my community immeasurably. Now I frequently am able to walk for short errands, trips to supermarket and such. It's only about half a mile, and it's better for my health. A couple of "no left turn signs," have also minimized the Merrill Lynch impact to some extent.