toronto food strategy: food access mapping

Toronto Food StrategyBring Food Home

Food Access Mapping

Barbara Emanuel

November, 2013

Toronto Food Strategy

Spearheaded by TPH to foster healthy & sustainable food system

City of Toronto’s Existing Food Connections

Toronto Food Strategy Approach

Build/strengthen networks by doing things together

Leveraging resources

Top down & bottom up strategiesfor change

Research & evaluation

Food Environment Mapping

Better understanding of spatial relationships among income, food access, etc

Changing the discussionon “food deserts”

Inadequate access to public transit

Few Amenities in Walking Distance

Low Household Income

Lack of Green Spaces

Few Healthy Affordable Food Sources

Health Inequalities & Inner Suburbs

Using TPH Inspector Data to Create Maps

Detroit Cleveland

= Low Income & no supermarket within 1km walking/driving distance

Mapping a Food Environment Index

1km radius - street network

BEWARE THE HIDDEN DANGERS OF PRETTY MAPS

Maps (like all research) tell us about the next set of questions to ask, rather than telling us THE ANSWERS

GIS Mapping: Questions to Ask

What’s the quality of the data used to create the map?

What was the methodology?

Is it telling the right story or sending us down the wrong path?

MRFEI Scores for Toronto

MRFEI Scores for Toronto

MRFEI Scores & Low Income

Morningside & Ellesmere

KingstonGalloway

Kipling & Finch

Warden Woods - Teesdale

Flemingdon Park

Markham & Ellesmere

Lotherton Pathway

East ScarbStorefront

Don Mills - Sheppard

Lotherton Pathway, Toronto – Closest discount grocery 2.5km

Problem in Toronto is NOT quantity of food stores but quality of retail in many areas

Less healthy food retail envir’t common across Toronto

Many lower income areas have low MRFEI but income does not predict food envir’t score

Schools more likely to have fast food within 500m/1km vs surrounding areas

Findings So Far

Findings So Far… NOT true that big food retailers are ignoring prime

locations in lowest income communities

Need to look beyond supermarkets at full food retail environment

Need to look at dynamic food sourcing (e.g. environments near homes AND schools, workplaces, transit, etc.)

Photo source: ERA Architects (2012). Healthy Apartment Neighbourhoods By Design: Barriers and Solutions.

Findings So Far

Density in problem areas doesn’t fit with traditional big food retail models (but they’re trying to adapt)

“Progressive” regulatory legacies can impede alternate food distribution models today

Little support for small food enterprises

Explanations?

Mobile Good Food Market

Working with Existing

Small Food Retailers

Healthier Corner Stores

Approx 8 convenience stores in Toronto for every supermarket

Kabul Market- Scarborough

Food Retail Assessment in Scarborough

Wide variation in small food store models

Many practical barriers for owners to integrating healthier foods

Residents value customer service highly

Insights from Research So Far

Very little institutional support exists for small-scale food retail

Many store owners keen to serve community, provide healthier foods

Most successful examples we saw prioritized positive relationships with customers

Insights from Research So Far

Community Consultations

What Are We Doing with the Research?

Informing implementation of new Residential Apartment Commercial zone

TPH Healthy Public PolicyTPH Healthy Public Policy

Examples of apt tower communities in GermanySource: ERA Architects (2010). Tower Neighbourhood Renewal in the Greater Golden Horseshoe

Brian Cook, Research ConsultantToronto Food Strategybcook@toronto.ca416-338-7864

Barbara Emanuel, ManagerToronto Food Strategybemanuel@toronto.ca416-392-7464