Explaining Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Travel for Food Shopping: The Roles of Income, Household Structure, and Metropolitan Residential Segregation in the United States
Publication: Journal of Urban Planning and Development
Volume 150, Issue 2
Abstract
Racial and ethnic minorities disproportionately reside in neighborhoods with low access to food. However, scholars have little evidence about whether this results in a disadvantage in travel for food shopping by race and ethnicity. This study overcomes previous limitations by using data and a method that allows for directly measuring travel to food stores by race and ethnicity at the individual level of data. The purpose is to determine whether racial and ethnic minorities experience longer travel times to food stores than White shoppers, and to evaluate factors that might contribute to differences by race and ethnicity. This study uses a nationally representative sample of data from the American Time Use Survey during the Years 2005–2019 and multilevel modeling regression that includes both individual and metropolitan-level data to estimate travel time spent on food shopping by race and ethnicity in US metropolitan areas, while controlling for other variables known to influence travel behavior. The findings indicate that Black, Asian, and Hispanic travelers experienced longer travel durations than White shoppers, with Black travelers spending 27% more travel time when shopping for food than White travelers. The disadvantage cannot be explained by differences in income or household structure, but the role of residential segregation remains unclear. This research reveals a need for policy interventions to address an unfair burden on racial and ethnic minorities that may contribute to diet-related diseases while also siphoning time from a limited daily schedule.
Get full access to this article
View all available purchase options and get full access to this article.
Data Availability Statement
Some or all data, models, or codes generated or used during the study are available in a repository or online in accordance with funder data retention policies (Ewing and Hamidi 2014; Flood et al. 2022; Logan n.d.; Manson et al. 2022; Murphy and Owen 2020).
References
Alwitt, L. F., and T. D. Donley. 1997. “Retail stores in poor urban neighborhoods.” J. Consum. Aff. 31 (1): 139–164. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1745-6606.1997.tb00830.x.
Beaulac, J., E. Kristjansson, and S. Cummins. 2009. “A systematic review of food deserts, 1966–2007.” Prev. Chronic Dis. 6: A105.
Chung, C., and S. L. Myers. 1999. “Do the poor pay more for food? An analysis of grocery store availability and food price disparities.” J. Consum. Aff. 33 (2): 276–296. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1745-6606.1999.tb00071.x.
de Dios Ortuzar, J., and L. G. Willumsen. 1994. Modelling transport. 2nd ed. Chichester, UK: Wiley.
Eisenhauer, E. 2001. “In poor health: Supermarket redlining and urban nutrition.” GeoJ. 53 (2): 125–133. https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1015772503007.
Ewing, R., and S. Hamidi. 2014. Measuring sprawl 2014. Washington, DC: Smart Growth America.
Flood, S. M., L. C. Sayer, and D. Backman. 2022. American time use survey data extract builder: Version 3.1 [dataset]. College Park, MD: Univ. of Maryland and Minneapolis.
Giuliano, G. 2003. “Travel, location and race/ethnicity.” Transp. Res. Part A Policy Pract. 37 (4): 351–372. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0965-8564(02)00020-4.
Gordon, C. et al. 2011. “Measuring food deserts in New York City's low-income neighborhoods.” Health Place 17 (2): 696–700. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.healthplace.2010.12.012.
Grengs, J. 2015. “Nonwork Accessibility as a Social Equity Indicator.” Int. J. Sustain. Transp. 9 (1): 1–14. https://doi.org/10.1080/15568318.2012.719582.
Gordon, C., N. Ghai, A. Talwalkar, and A. Goodman. 2007. Eating well in Harlem: How available is healthy food? New York: New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene.
Halvorsen, R., and R. Palmquist. 1980. “The interpretation of dummy variables in semilogarithmic equations.” Am. Econ. Rev. 70: 474–475.
Hamrick, K. S., and D. Hopkins. 2012. “The time cost of access to food—Distance to the grocery store as measured in minutes.” Electron. Int. J. Time Use Res. 9 (1): 28–58. https://doi.org/10.13085/eIJTUR.9.1.28-58.
Handy, S. L., and K. J. Clifton. 2001. “Local shopping as a strategy for reducing automobile travel.” Transportation 28 (4): 317–346. https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1011850618753.
Helling, A., and D. S. Sawicki. 2003. “Race and residential accessibility to shopping and services.” Hous. Policy Debate 14 (1–2): 69–101. https://doi.org/10.1080/10511482.2003.9521469.
Hillier, A., C. C. Cannuscio, A. Karpyn, J. McLaughlin, M. Chilton, and K. Glanz. 2011. “How far do low-income parents travel to shop for food? Empirical evidence from two urban neighborhoods.” Urban Geogr. 32 (5): 712–729. https://doi.org/10.2747/0272-3638.32.5.712.
Hox, J. J., M. Moerbeek, and R. van de Schoot. 2018. Multilevel analysis: Techniques and applications. 3rd ed. New York: Routledge.
Hu, L. 2021. “Gender differences in commuting travel in the U.S.: Interactive effects of race/ethnicity and household structure.” Transportation 48 (2): 909–929. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11116-020-10085-0.
Janda, K. M., D. Salvo, N. Ranjit, D. M. Hoelscher, A. Nielsen, P. Lemoine, J. Casnovsky, and A. van den Berg. 2022. “Who shops at their nearest grocery store? A cross-sectional exploration of disparities in geographic food access among a low-income, racially/ethnically diverse cohort in central Texas.” J. Hunger Environ. Nutr. 1–21. https://doi.org/10.1080/19320248.2022.2128962.
Jargowsky, P. A. 2020. “Racial and economic segregation in the US: Overlapping and reinforcing dimensions.” In Handbook of urban segregation, edited by S. Musterd, 151–168. Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar.
Landis, J. D. 2022. “Minority travel disparities and residential segregation: Evidence from the 2017 national household travel survey.” Transp. Res. Part D: Transp. Environ. 112: 103455. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.trd.2022.103455.
LeDoux, T. F., and I. Vojnovic. 2013. “Going outside the neighborhood: The shopping patterns and adaptations of disadvantaged consumers living in the lower eastside neighborhoods of Detroit, Michigan.” Health Place 19: 1–14. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.healthplace.2012.09.010.
Levine, J., J. Grengs, and L. A. Merlin. 2019. From mobility to accessibility: Transforming urban transportation and land-use planning. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.
Logan, J., n.d. “Diversity and disparities project [WWW document].” Accessed March 14, 2023. https://s4.ad.brown.edu/projects/diversity/index.htm.
Manson, S., J. Schroeder, D. Van Riper, T. Kugler, and S. Ruggles. 2022. IPUMS national historical geographic information system: Version 17.0 [dataset]. Minneapolis: IPUMS.
Massey, D. S. 1990. “American apartheid: Segregation and the making of the underclass.” Am. J. Sociol. 96 (2): 329–357. https://doi.org/10.1086/229532.
Massey, D. S. 2020. “Still the linchpin: Segregation and stratification in the USA.” Race Social Probl. 12 (1): 1–12. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12552-019-09280-1.
Metz, D. 2008. “The myth of travel time saving.” Transport Rev. 28 (3): 321–336. https://doi.org/10.1080/01441640701642348.
Meyersohn, N. 2020. “How the rise of supermarkets left out black America | CNN Business.” CNN. Accessed June 16, 2020. https://www.cnn.com/2020/06/16/business/grocery-stores-access-race-inequality/index.html.
Mokhtarian, P. L., and C. Chen. 2004. “TTB or not TTB, that is the question: A review and analysis of the empirical literature on travel time (and money) budgets.” Transp. Res. Part A Policy Pract. 38 (9–10): 643–675. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tra.2003.12.004.
Moore, L. V., and A. V. Diez Roux. 2006. “Associations of neighborhood characteristics with the location and type of food stores.” Am. J. Public Health 96 (2): 325–331. https://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.2004.058040.
Morland, K., S. Wing, A. Diez Roux, and C. Poole. 2002. “Neighborhood characteristics associated with the location of food stores and food service places.” Am. J. Preventive Med. 22 (1): 23–29. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0749-3797(01)00403-2.
Murphy, B., and A. Owen. 2020. Access across America: Auto 2018 data. Minneapolis: Accessibility Observatory, Center for Transportation Studies, Univ. of Minnesota.
Raja, S., C. Ma, and P. Yadav. 2008. “Beyond food deserts: Measuring and mapping racial disparities in neighborhood food environments.” J. Plann. Educa. Res. 27 (4): 469. https://doi.org/10.1177/0739456X08317461.
Robinson, W. S. 1950. “Ecological correlations and the behavior of individuals.” Am. Sociol. Rev. 15 (3): 351–357. https://doi.org/10.2307/2087176.
Semega, J., and M. Kollar. 2022. U.S. Census Bureau, current population reports, income in the United States: 2021. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Publishing Office.
Shannon, J., and W. J. Christian. 2017. “What is the relationship between food shopping and daily mobility? A relational approach to analysis of food access.” GeoJ. 82 (4): 769–785. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10708-016-9716-0.
Smith, L. G., M. J. Widener, B. Liu, S. Farber, L. M. Minaker, Z. Patterson, K. Larsen, and J. Gilliland. 2022. “Comparing household and individual measures of access through a food environment lens: What household food opportunities are missed when measuring access to food retail at the individual level?” Ann. Am. Assoc. Geogr. 112 (2): 542–562. https://doi.org/10.1080/24694452.2021.1930513.
Snijders, T. A. B., and R. J. Bosker. 2012. Multilevel analysis: An introduction to basic and advanced multilevel modeling. 2nd ed. Los Angeles: Sage.
USDA (U.S. Department of Agriculture). 2022. USDA ERS–Documentation [WWW document]. Accessed November 1, 2023. https://www.ers.usda.gov/data-products/food-access-research-atlas/documentation/.
Ver Ploeg, et al. 2009. Access to affordable and nutritious food-measuring and understanding food deserts and their consequences: Report to congress. (No. Administrative Publication No. (AP-036)). Washington, DC: United States Department of Agriculture.
Ver Ploeg, M., L. Mancino, J. E. Todd, D. M. Clay, and B. Scharadin. 2015. Where do Americans usually shop for food and how do they travel to get there? Initial findings from the national household food acquisition and purchase survey. (No. Economic Information Bulletin Number 138). Washington, DC: US Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service.
Yan, X. 2021. “Toward accessibility-based planning: Addressing the myth of travel cost savings.” J. Am. Plann. Assoc. 87 (3): 409–423. https://doi.org/10.1080/01944363.2020.1850321.
Zahavi, Y., and A. Talvitie. 1980. “Regularities in travel time and money expenditures.” Transp. Res. Rec. 750: 13–19.
Zenk, S. N., A. J. Schulz, B. A. Israel, S. A. James, S. Bao, and M. L. Wilson. 2005. “Neighborhood racial composition, neighborhood poverty, and the spatial accessibility of supermarkets in Metropolitan Detroit.” Am. J. Public Health 95 (4): 660–667. https://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.2004.042150.
Zenk, S. N., A. J. Schulz, B. A. Israel, G. Mentz, P. Y. Miranda, A. Opperman, and A. M. Odoms-Young. 2014. “Food shopping behaviors and exposure to discrimination.” Public Health Nutr. 17 (5): 1167–1176. https://doi.org/10.1017/S136898001300075X.
Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Journal of Urban Planning and Development
Volume 150 • Issue 2 • June 2024
Copyright
© 2024 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Apr 11, 2023
Accepted: Jan 22, 2024
Published online: Apr 2, 2024
Published in print: Jun 1, 2024
Discussion open until: Sep 2, 2024
ASCE Technical Topics:
- Analysis (by type)
- Buildings
- Business management
- Diseases
- Engineering fundamentals
- Health hazards
- Infrastructure
- Practice and Profession
- Public administration
- Public health and safety
- Regression analysis
- Residential buildings
- Residential location
- Statistical analysis (by type)
- Structural engineering
- Structures (by type)
- Traffic engineering
- Transportation engineering
- Travel patterns
- Urban and regional development
- Urban areas
Authors
Metrics & Citations
Metrics
Citations
Download citation
If you have the appropriate software installed, you can download article citation data to the citation manager of your choice. Simply select your manager software from the list below and click Download.