A recent study found 39 fast food restaurants and only one sit-down eating establishment within a two-square mile area of the mostly poor, inner-city community of South Central, Los Angeles. An earlier survey of 21 major U.S. metropolitan areas found 30% fewer supermarkets in low-income neighborhoods.
Such conditions are described by academics as matters of “food security,” meaning the availability of healthy food within a given area. Since residents in areas with a higher concentration of supermarkets eat more fruits and vegetables, the link between a healthy diet and supermarkets is of great consequence.
The following interactive explains the history of “supermarket flight” in communities like South Central LA and Hunters Point Bayview in San Francico while describing some potential solutions to this public health problem.
- Testimony of Leslie Mikkelsen Before the Senate Appropriations Committee, Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies, via The Prevention Institute
- Combating Supermarket Flight in Los Angeles, The Urban Ecologist, via the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco
- Why There Will Be No Chain Supermarkets In Poor Inner-City Neighborhoods, Department of Economics and Statistics, California State University, Los Angeles
- Free Shuttles Can Close The Grocery Gap: How inner-city supermarkets can turn a profit and improve their customers’ health, UC Davis Medical Center
- Push for inner-city supermarkets continues, Philadelphia Business Journal
- Retail in the Urban Neighborhood: Identifying Business Opportunities in Under-served Areas, University of Wisconsin-Extension, Center for Community Economic Development
- “Fresh start for urban supermarkets,” Philadelphia Inquirer
- The Community Food Movement in the USA, Centre for Environment and Society,University of Essex
- Supermarket Shuttle Programs: A Feasibility Study for Supermarkets Located in Low-Income, Transit Dependent, Urban Neighborhoods in California, University Of California, Davis Center for Advanced Studies in Nutrition and Social Marketing (PDF)
- The Business Case for Pursuing Retail Opportunities in the Inner City, The Boston Consulting Group, Inc. (PDF)
- Seeds of change: Strategies for food security for the inner city, UC Davis
- Transportation and Food: The Importance of Access, A Policy Brief by the Center for Food and Justice Urban and Environmental Policy Institute, Occidental College Los Angeles
- Nobody Knows You When You’re Down and Out , Recorded in 1929 by Bessie Smith