A Method for Estimating Neighborhood Characterization in Studies of the Association with Availability of Sit-down Restaurants and Supermarkets

Although neighborhood-level access to food differs by sociodemographic factors, almost all research on neighborhoods and food access has used a single construct of neighborhood context, such as income or race. Neighborhoods possess many interrelated built environment and sociodemographic characteristics, a condition that obscures relationships between neighborhood factors and food access. The objective of this study is to examine the association between neighborhood characterization and neighborhood food availability while accounting for the effects of many interrelated aspects of neighborhoods associated with food access. We used cluster analyses method that used multiple measures (e.g., population density, mix of land use, and sociodemographic factors) that are easy to obtain to define six neighborhood types in 1993 in the Twin Cities Region, Minnesota. We then used mixed effects regression models to estimate the differences in the relative availability of sit-down restaurants and supermarkets in 1993, 2001, and 2011 across the six neighborhood types. Between 1993 and 2011, inner city neighborhoods experienced a greater increase in the percent of sit-down restaurants compared with urban core, urban, and aging suburb. The differences in the percent of sit-down restaurants between inner city and aging suburb, high-income suburb and suburban edge neighborhoods increased between 1993 and 2011. Using classification of neighborhood type based on sociodemographic and built environment characteristics, we found a complex and increasingly varied distribution of restaurants and food stores. The temporal increase in the relative availability of sit-down restaurants in inner cities after accounting for all restaurants might be associated with a higher proportion of residents who eat-away-from-home, which is associated with higher calorie and fat intake. Keywords: built environment, sociodemographic, food stores, urbanization