Friedrich --

A few days ago I cited a study linking urban sprawl to obesity and high blood pressure. Bradford McKee in the NYTimes discusses the studies here, and does a good job of consulting with skeptics as well as public-health and New-Urbanist types.

Sample passage:

Stay-at-home wives have often complained about the isolation of suburbia, working parents point to the killer commutes and teenagers moan about the boredom. Now Dr. Jackson believes there are persuasive, if yet circumstantial, links between the suburbs and certain physical and mental diseases. If so, he said, the building of larger and larger suburbs might be viewed as a colossal mistake.

Best,

Michael

I think one of you mentioned the other day the link between IQ and diet, too. So...do the suburbs cause lower IQ's, too??

Posted by: annette on September 4, 2003 02:14 PM

Has anyone mapped suburbs carefully enough to determine how often the suburb effects are just flatland effects?

As a hunch, I'd suspect suburbs, but one notices that slanted ground usually means thinner people.

But perhaps there are more suburbs and malls on flatter land because it's easier to sprawl in the wider open less zoned flatlands.

Posted by: j.c. on September 4, 2003 04:05 PM






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