Page 4 - WILMAPCO - Summer 2022

New Report Examines Health Correlations with Transportation and Land Use
Anew WILMAPCO Data Report examines correlations between our built environment and health behaviors and outcomes. Do people living in places with more walking connectivity generally report better physical health? Are communities near busy roads more likely to have higher asthma rates? How about neighborhoods near sites that pollute the air? The report explores these questions and more.
To kick things off, it looks at how closely WILMAPCO’s Social Determinants of Health (SDOH) index is tied to actual poor health conditions, compared to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Social Vulnerability Index (SVI). The SDOH index includes multiple categories of health stressors, such as poverty, education, racial/ethnic minority segregation, and food access. The SVI is a similar, but much broader index. SVI is being increasingly applied both nationally and locally to identify vulnerable populations. Overall, we found the SDOH index was much better than SVI at identifying places that actually had poor health risks and conditions like asthma, poor mental health, obesity, and physical inactivity.
The remainder of the Data Report examines correlations between asthma and physical inactivity and land use and transportation conditions. We compared the underlying socio-economic and land use conditions between places with the most and least asthma. We also performed a similar analysis for the most and least physically active places.
Census Tracts with the Highest and Lowest Asthma Rates
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Minority
Renter occupied
Single
parent households
Households in poverty
Housing near busy road
Housing near freight network
Housing Air
Finally, the report examined data regionally. We found, for example, that places with higher asthma rates tend to be located near the freight network and sites that received air violations. While several factors can lead to the development of asthma, this does suggest communities exposed to more emissions show higher rates
that places with limited physical activity often have better underlying walking conditions and park access. While sidewalks, pathways, and trails always support a healthy lifestyle, deeper SDOH factors likely have a
To read the Data Report, please visit www.wilmapco.org/data-reports.
Top 19 CTs in asthma
Bottom 20 CTs in asthma
Asthma
Top vs Bottom Tracts
near industrial
violations