Indicator PI.7.b Neighborhood completeness indicator for key retail services

PI.7.b Neighborhood completeness indicator for key retail services

Please click on the neighborhoods above to access neighborhood level maps for this indicator.

Data Source

Location of auto repair shops, banks and credit unions, beauty or barber shops, bike shops, dry cleaners, gyms, hardware stores, laundromats, and video stores or movie theaters from Dun & Bradstreet, 2007.

Location of eating establishments (restaurants) from the San Francisco Department of Public Health, 2007.

Healthy reatil food dataset was purchased from ESRI (Redlands, CA), a private vendor, in Spring 2009. It included all businesses for San Francisco. From this dataset, the specific food retailers were selected for inclusion of this indicator. InfoUSA collects information on approximately 12 million private and public US companies. Individual businesses are located by address geocoding—not all will have an exact location. The ESRI geocoder integrates an address-based approach with more than forty million residential and commercial U.S. address records from the Tele Atlas Address Points database.

Additional locations for gyms from WhitePages.com, 2008. Accessed online at http://www.WhitePages.com on February 1, 2008.

Location of pharmacies from the State of California Department of Consumer Affairs, 2008. Accessed online at http://www2.dca.ca.gov/pls/wllpub/wllqryna$lcev2.startup?p_qte_code=PHX&p_qte_pgm_code=7200 on January 24, 2008.

Applied Geographic Solutions, Inc. Spring 2007 Update: Current Year Estimates. Methodology available at: http://www.appliedgeographic.com/library.html.

Map and table created by San Francisco Department of Public Health, Environmental Health Section using ArcGIS software.

Map data is presented at the level of the census tract. Detailed information regarding geographic units of analysis, their definitions, and their boundaries can be found in the HDMT at the following links:

http://www.thehdmt.org/etc/Geographic_Units_of_Analysis.pdf

http://www.thehdmt.org/data_map_methods.php

Explanation and Limitations

The HDMT neighborhood completeness indicator is presented as a profile of key public and retail services and goods available to San Francisco residents in their neighborhoods rather than a number or summary score. Interpretation of the profile with regards to completeness also depends on the density and mix of services, the land area, and the population. Completeness does not reflect any measure of quality of services.

Given the diversity of services in most San Francisco neighborhoods, neighborhood completeness has been divided into three separate maps: public services, retail services, and food availability for ease of viewing. These maps are intended to be examined comprehensively when assessing neighborhood completeness and proximity to goods and services. The other maps are located at Indicator PI.7.a.

Click on the neighborhood name in the table to view the retail service and food availability maps.

Included in this indicator (PI.6.d) are twelve retail services, necessary for meeting the daily needs of neighborhood residents. These key retail services include auto repair shops, banks and credit unions, beauty and barber shops, bike shops, dry cleaners, eating establishments, gyms, hardware stores, laundromats, pharmacies, retail food markets, and video rental stores and movie theaters. Each neighborhood map displays all key retail services in the Planning neighborhood boundary and the key retail services in adjacent neighborhoods. The neighborhood table includes the count of each key retail service; total counts of all key retail services; and the population density and area of each neighborhood.

Retail service data was combined into a database and validated by visiting three neighborhoods and visually confirming the presence of those retail services within ¼ mile radius around an intersection for each neighborhood. From our retail service database, 20.45% of the services were not found during our neighborhood site validations. These retail services either had gone out of business, was incorrectly categorized by the original data source, or existed elsewhere and had an incorrect address. In Addition, an average of ten new key retail services per validation area were identified that should have been included in our database. These new individual services fell into seven of the twelve key retail services for this indicator.

A large majority of data was obtained from a commercially available database (Dun and Bradstreet, 2007). Duplicates, probable miscodes, and non-San Francisco services were identified and deleted from the database. Data accuracy was also supplemented by cross-checking with Internet phone books, mapping websites, and personal knowledge of Department of Public Health staff.

Food availability for the indicator is defined by the number of eating establishments and retail food markets in each neighborhood. Data for eating establishments and retail food markets were obtained from the Environmental Health Section of the San Francisco Department of Public Health, which regularly inspect all food establishments in San Francisco to ensure they meet City health and safety code requirements. Eating establishments were defined as fast food outlets, restaurants, and take-out establishments. The following are definitions for each of the three eating establishments presented in the food availability maps:

Bars, catering companies, push-carts, institutional cafeterias, and private clubs were not included in the retail service database. Retail food markets were defined as supermarkets, grocery stores, and produce stands. Retail bakeries, candy stores, smoke shops, theaters, and stores primarily selling other goods but may include some specialty food items were not included. Numerous food markets may also sell take-out and prepared food ready for consumption; however, they are counted as retail food markets, rather than eating establishments.

Although geographic distance is just one dimension of accessibility, proximity to services does promote increased walking and biking, reduced daily vehicle trips and miles traveled, increased possibilities for healthful and meaningful work, and increased interactions among neighbors and others on the street. While this indicator demonstrates the geographic distribution of key retail services within a neighborhood, two residents of the same neighborhood may have very different access to any service, due to the size and topography of the neighborhood, available transportation options, cost of services, hours of operation, and language and cultural accessibility.

For additional definitions, caveats, and explanations to the retail services included on this list, please visit the following Public Infrastructure Indicator pages:

Why is this a Community Health Indicator?

Being within walking distance of neighborhood goods and services promotes physical activity, reduces vehicle trips and miles traveled, and increases neighborhood cohesion and safety.a By reducing vehicle trips and miles traveled, dense neighborhoods with diverse and mixed land uses can also reduce air and noise pollution, which subsequently impacts associated respiratory and noise-related health conditions. According to the US Green Building Council, research has shown that "living in a mixed-use environment within walking distance of shops and services results in increased walking and biking, which improve human cardiovascular and respiratory health and reduce the risk of hypertension and obesity."b The presence of a supermarket in a neighborhood predicts higher fruit and vegetable consumption and a reduced prevalence of overweight and obesity.c,d A recent study (2007) in New York revealed that low-income non-white populations are at a disadvantage when trying to access daily goods and services. There is a stronger relationship for black populations than Latino populations but both populations have less access.e  Physical activity among children is higher when they have access to sidewalks, desirable destinations to walk to, and when children face fewer traffic hazards.f  Finally, a review of reviews commissioned by the National Institute of Health and Clinical Excellence in London found that having a mix of retail within walking distance is correlated with increased walking and physical activity.f

  1. Moore Iacofano Gostsman, Inc. Richmond general plan update, issues & opportunities, paper #8: community health and wellness (draft). 2007. http://www.cityofrichmondgeneralplan.org/docManager/1000000640/Existing%20Condictions%20Report%20August%202007.pdf
  2. US Green Building Council. LEED rating systems, neighborhood development. http://www.usgbc.org/DisplayPage.aspx?CMSPageID=148
  3. Morland K, Diez Roux AV, Wing S. Supermarkets, other food stores, and obesity: the atherosclerosis risk in communities study. Am J Prev Med. 2006;30(4):333-9
  4. Inagami S, Cohen DA, Finch BK, Asch SM. You are where you shop: grocery store locations, weight, and neighborhoods. Am J Prev Med. 2006;31(1):10-7.

  5. Purciel, Marnie. Spatial Equity in New York City Neighborhoods. A Thesis Presented to the Faculty of The Graduate School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation and The Mailman School of Public Health, Columbia University. May 2007.

  6. Bauman A, Bull F. Environmental Correlates of Physical Activity and Walking in Adults and Children: A Review of Reviews. London: National Institute of Health and Clinical Excellence; 2007.