Cause & Effect

Early in my career, I had the great opportunity to work at a firm that specialized in park and recreation planning, which not only gave a fabulous perspective on municipal planning (and reinforced my love of both the large ad the small scale) as well as the inventive use of mapping to illustrate particular schema. A recent post on People and Place featured a map that drove this point home, in particular the cause and effect between parks and childhood obesity. For reference: ““Areas with fewer parks (lighter rather than darker green) have higher rates of childhood obesity (larger red circles)”


:: image via People and Place

Some info, via a link to a great story in the Economist, ‘Mapping a better world’. A quote worth showing: “But mapping technology has matured into a tool for social justice. Whether it is to promote health, safety, fair politics or a cleaner environment, foundations, non-profit groups and individuals around the world are finding that maps can help them make their case far more intuitively and effectively than speeches, policy papers or press releases.”

One thought on “Cause & Effect

  1. I think that map could be even more powerful when overlaid with income level, housing type, and maybe as a “what to do next” with a transportation map. Very interesting study.

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