James Rojas loved how his childhood home brought family and neighbors together. The L.A. home had a big side yard facing the street where families celebrated birthdays and holidays. Uncles played poker. Aunts tended a garden. Children roamed freely. Mexican elders—with their sternness and house dresses—socialized with their American-born descendants—with their Beatles albums and mini-skirts. Rojas was shocked to find some would look down on this neighborhood. “Why do so many Latinos love their neighborhood so much if they are bad?” he wondered. Rojas, in grad school, learned that neighborhood planners focused far more on automobiles in their designs than they did on the human experience or Latino cultural influences. He wanted to change that. Rojas has spent ...
Local planners have the power to help create healthy, fair communities. Unfortunately, common planning practices have contributed to the high percentage of poor people and people of color who live in unhealthy places, widening disparities in health and wealth. That's why our friends at ChangeLab Solutions created Long Range-Planning for Health, Equity & Prosperity: A Primer for Local Governments. This can help planners prioritize health and equity in their work. "By integrating health and equity considerations into planning practices, planners have the power to revise past planning decisions and create healthy, equitable, and prosperous communities," ChangeLab reports.
Place Matters for Health Equity
Where you live matters for your health. Inequitable city planning, ...
Check out these new Spanish-language research materials on the alarming state of Latino housing, transportation, and green space from our team at Salud America! UT Health San Antonio. The new Spanish materials are based on an English research review earlier in 2019. The research found that, sadly, U.S. Latino communities face unaffordable housing, unreliable public transportation, and a lack of green space and parks. This limits Latinos’ access to health-promoting assets─medical care, good schools, healthy food, and physical activity. This also contributes to health inequities. Fortunately, community leaders can adopt dynamic land-use methods, public-private partnerships, and community involvement to build and revitalize Latino neighborhoods. This can create affordable ...
Amanda Merck isn’t only a content curator for Salud America! at UT Health San Antonio, a member of many health committees, and an urban planning student at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She is also a fighter for equitable transportation, equitable access to parks, and an advocate for children who experience trauma. Merck is a poster child for civic engagement for health equity─and she is dedicating her time and career to help countless others become civically engaged, too.
Merck: ‘Never Any Talk about Civic Engagement’
Merck grew up in many different places including California, Texas, and Montana. As the daughter of a low-income, high-school dropout, working was meant to pay the bills. “There was never any talk about civic engagement nor ...
Much of the disparity we see in traffic deaths and chronic disease is related to how we build roads and communities. Improving safety on our streets, sidewalks, and public spaces can help address decades of disparities. Let’s use #SaludTues on Dec. 17, 2019, to tweet about how you can take time at the end of 2019 to plan for a safer and more active 2020. WHAT: #SaludTues Tweetchat: “How to Plan for a Safer and More Active 2020”
TIME/DATE: 1-2 p.m. ET Tuesday, Dec. 17, 2019
WHERE: On Twitter with hashtag #SaludTues
HOST: @SaludAmerica
CO-HOSTS: America Walks (@americawalks); National Aging and Disability Transportation Center (@NADTCmobility); Safe Routes National Partnership (@SafeRoutesNow); National Complete Streets Coalition (@completestreets)
OPTIONAL ...
Fred Dock knows that, as cities grow, managing transportation gets tougher. Dock, who headed up transportation for Pasadena, Calif. (34.4% Latino), also knows many cities overly focus on reducing automobile congestion and boosting speed, thus neglect walking, biking, and transit. Two things happen in these cities. Roads become dangerous for people walking and biking, and people are forced to depend on automobiles—the dirtiest, least efficient, and most expensive mode of travel. Dock wanted to help Pasadena out of this trap. Pasadena city leaders hoped to create an integrated, multimodal transportation system with choices and accessibility for everyone. But they wouldn’t achieve this vision using current auto-centric road metrics—that’s when Dock stepped up to ...
When was the last time you didn't use your car to get around? A lack of transportation options and safe streets make it too difficult for too many Americans to not use personal vehicles, according to Ian Thomas, the State and Local Program Director of America Walks. Check out this discussion on the #SaludTalks Podcast, Episode 10, "Streets Found Wanting"! WHAT: A #SaludTalks discussion on auto-dependence and how that reliance impacts everyone GUESTS: Ian Thomas, the State and Local Program Director of America Walks
WHERE: Available wherever fine podcasts are downloaded, including Apple Podcasts, Spotify, SoundCloud, Tune In, and others
WHEN: The episode went live at 8:30 a.m., Nov. 13, 2019 In this episode, we explored questions such as: Why is it that ...
Do you know how roadways are graded? Most transportation indicators grade based on the level of motor vehicle traffic on a road, with little consideration for people walking, bike or taking transit, and vehicle travel. This leads planners to design car-focused roads that neglect transit and non-motorized travel, which is counterproductive to social, environmental, and health goals. Using level of service (LOS), for example, to assess road performance tends to expand roadways and increase vehicular speeds to benefit cars and trucks only. This ends up enabling more vehicle travel and reducing feasibility of walking, biking, and busing. That’s why five early-adopter cities in California transitioned away from a narrow focus on moving as many cars as fast as possible, to a more ...
The methods used to measure and analyze the impact of transportation projects matter for health, equity and sustainability. Vehicle delay, for example, is a poor measure of transportation impact and incorrectly equates low levels of auto delay with mobility and preservation of the environment. Yet, many regions and states rely on vehicle delay to determine which projects get funded and expedited. Measuring the amount and distance of vehicle travel rather than delay encourages infrastructure for transit and non-motorized travel and facilitates mixed-use, transit-oriented development (TOD) and infill development. Measuring vehicle miles traveled can help cities reach climate, equity, health, and sustainability goals. Let’s use #SaludTues on November 5, 2019, to tweet about ...
