Most Americans take for granted our ability to get to the grocery store. But many people in Nashville live in areas that are more than a mile to a full-service grocery store, and lack their own means of transportation.
Re/Storing Nashville has been working to build a picture of what food access looks like in Nashville's food deserts: Cayce Place, Edgehill and North Nashville, through a Food Transit Assessment. Information on grocery stores vs. fast food access, painstakingly compiled by Doctor David Padgett of Tennessee State University, helps give us a visual of how easy it is to find fast food outlets in some areas, and how difficult it is to get to a grocery store.
A recent report, released in conjuction with First Lady Michelle Obama's Let's Move campaign, called the Food Environment Atlas also gave us valuable information about the state of food security in Davidson County. One startling statistic was there was nearly ten times as many fast food outlets as grocery stores in Davidson County, with .92 fast food outlets for every 1,000 residents and only .2 grocery stores per 1,000 residents.
This information, combined with previous food asset mapping in Nashville, helps communities visualize existing resources, as well as room for improvement in their environments.
The Food Transit Assessment is the first step in providing a picture for what we can do to improve access to fresh foods in neighborhoods, and ultimately improve the health of our communities.