Do Densely Populated Areas Receive a Health Benefit?
For a variety of reasons, only residents of the most densely populated areas drive cars less. The inhabitants of these areas may not be able to afford a car, parking may be difficult, or, very rarely, feel they are adequately served by transit. If the inhabitants are driving less than more sparsely inhabited areas, are they receiving any health benefit from the excercise they are getting by walking to transit, or walking to their destinations? To explore this, I used a data set from the United Way. I converted mortality rates from heart disease, stroke and diabetes into a single indicator, since these three diseases can be traced to lifelong sedentary habits. To normalize the data by zip code, I used the following formula: heart disease+stroke+diabetes= sedentary disease indicator area A cursory overview of Los Angeles County, overlaid with the disease indicator, reveals that densely populated areas probably do not receive a health benefit: The darkest blue represents the most densely
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