Introduction: Food deserts, districts with little or no access to foods needed to maintain a healthy diet but often served by plenty of fast food restaurants (Wikipedia), are a problem in our society.  Our visualization will help policy makers understand the relationships between food options and to-be-determined human-focused variables, such as obesity and demographic data, and other relevant variables such as zoning laws and public transportation in hopes that this will create awareness of the issues.  Ultimately, we hope this awareness will lead to solutions such as adding food options, changing zoning laws, implementing additional policy changes, and providing more education, all of which will increase the health of the residents.

The Problem in More Detail: In the past, obesity was thought to be a disease that affected people based upon their individual habits.  However, recent research has shown that the “built environment” substantially affects an individual’s odds of being obese (among other health outcomes).  In research focused on food store access, epidemiologists have found associations between the location of supermarkets in census tracts and the health of the people living in those tracts.  For example, according Morland et al. 2006, the presence of a supermarket in a census tract was associated with a 22% decrease in the odds of obesity (that is, compared with people who lived in a census tract without a supermarket, there were 1 in 5 fewer obese people in census tracts with a supermarket).  Yet, the distribution of supermarkets remains unequal; there are more supermarkets in wealthier areas, and fewer in poorer areas.

Overview of Project Details as of 2-12-10:

1. Goals:
   1. To help people improve health by creating awareness around food deserts
   2. Create a tool that may be used by others in other locations for similar purposes
2. Primary Audience: Policy makers.  With this information, policy makers can focus their efforts on possible solutions, whether it be more food options, education of the residents about the food options available to them, and/or providing means to overcome financial barriers.
3. Secondary Audiences: 1) Consumers living in districts.  2) Community and other advocacy groups that represent these districts.  With this information, these groups can raise awareness of food desert issues, learn where food options are available, apply pressure to decision makers, and, ultimately, overcome this problem. 
4. Initial geographic focus: Ypsilanti and/or Detroit
5. 5. Next Steps:
   1. Project and Concept Definition:
      1. Agree as a team on the variables, and ensure data is available to support these
      2. Determine possible visualization options that will best represent this data
      3. Define personas for selected audiences
      4. Sketch concept ideas
      5. Determine implementation approach and related tools
      6. Present initial concepts and approach to Professor Adar for his feedback
   2. Implementation and User Testing:
      1. Work on lo-fi implementation, present lo-fi to representative users, iterate
      2. Work on hi-fi implementation, present hi-fi to representative users, iterate
      3. Finalize, create project documentation, and launch
   3. Possible post-project launch activities: find project owner/champion and create awareness for the tool