THE DYNAMICS AND IMPACTS OF RETAIL SUPERMARKET DECENTRALIZATION IN DETROIT, MICHIGAN By Timothy F. LeDoux A DISSERTATION Submitted to Michigan State University In partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Geography – Doctor of Philosophy 2013 ABSTRACT THE DYNAMICS AND IMPACTS OF RETAIL SUPERMARKET DECENTRALIZATION IN DETROIT, MICHIGAN By Timothy F. LeDoux This dissertation integrates a social ecological framework with GIS, historical records, survey data and multivariate statistics to examine the transformation of the tri-County Detroit, Michigan food environment from 1970 to 2010. It documents how patterns of retail supermarket decentralization combined with a racially selective residential suburbanization process to create an uneven food environment characterized by a city-suburb dichotomy in which the predominately African American city of Detroit was devoid of national and regional supermarkets and the predominately-White suburbs were awash in stores. It shows how these disparities were further exacerbated by a massive economic restructuring among the major national and regional supermarkets operating within the tri-County, Detroit region. Last, it examines how disadvantaged residents responded to these changing conditions and how limited food environments shape public health outcomes as measured by dietary-intake levels. In so doing, this dissertation challenges several assumptions and fills in some missing gaps within the existing “food desert” literature. First, it tests the prevalent assumption within the “food desert” discourse that socially and economically marginalized residents living in a limited food environment disproportionately rely on the convenience, corner grocery and liquor stores nearest to them for their food provisions. This dissertation finds that socially and economically marginalized residents—regardless of economical and physical mobility constraints—overwhelming shop outside their immediate food environment at independent, discount and national and regional full-service supermarkets in the city of Detroit and its suburbs. Consequently, this research shows that direct effects of the immediate food environment in explaining differentials in dietary-intake levels is assuaged by such shopping patterns. Sociodemographic factors play a greater role in explaining differentials in dietary-intake levels while the local food environment plays an indirect role by imposing additional travel burdens upon an already marginalized population. Second, this dissertation elucidates how rates of retail supermarket accessibility have changed in relation to levels of neighborhood economic deprivation and neighborhood racial composition. It shows that there were initially very few differences with respect to store composition and accessibility levels across the tri-County Detroit region in 1970. However, by 1980 racial and economic disparities in store composition and accessibility levels emerged. Low-income White census tracts began to have more national and regional supermarkets than comparable low-income African American tracts. Moreover, racial composition became a major force in explaining the presence of a national and regional supermarket across tri-County Detroit by 1990. The emergence of race also reflected a polarized landscape in which impoverished African American census tracts had fewer national and regional supermarkets and a greater number of corner grocery and liquor stores than affluent White census tracts. Last, it tests the methodological assumption that neighborhood processes related to the food environment can be captured accurately by arbitrary administrative boundaries such as a census tract. Utilizing spatial clustering algorithms to generate new neighborhood configurations across the study area, this dissertation shows that the spatial inequities in the tri-County Detroit food environment and the processes of racial and economic stratification driving them are not an artifact of census geography. Extreme disparities between low-income African American neighborhoods and wealthy White neighborhoods persist. Copyright by TIMOTHY F. LEDOUX 2013 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This dissertation was completed with the help and guidance of my committee members, Dr. Igor Vojnovic, Dr. Bruce Wm. Pigozzi, Dr. Joseph P. Messina and Dr. Eva Kassens-Noor. I owe much to their mentorship and support. I also owe a great deal of gratitude to Dr. Joe T. Darden whose insights on Detroit have informed many aspects of this document. I am forever indebted to the support, encouragement and patience of my family, friends and colleagues in the Geography Department at Michigan State University. This dissertation would have never seen the day of light if it were not for the unwavering love and support of my wife and son, Erin N. Luchenbill and Alasdair D. LeDoux. I owe them more gratitude than words can capture. This work also would not be possible without the behind the scenes administrative support of Sharon Ruggles, Claudia Brown and Judy Reginek. A heartfelt thank you goes out to the members and staff at Detroit Wayne County Health Authority, Data Driven Detroit, the Burton Historical Collection, the Bentley Historical Library and the Arthur M. Woodford Local History Center for their help and encouragement along the way. Part of this work was supported by a dissertation grant from the Association of American Geographers. The survey data utilized in Chapter 3 was made possible by a National Science Foundation Human and Social Dynamic Grant SES 0624263. Last, I am grateful to Elsevier for allowing permission to reproduce portions of Chapter 3 that were published in: LeDoux, Timothy & Igor Vojnovic, 2013. Going Outside the Neighborhood: The Shopping Patterns and Adaptations of Disadvantaged Consumers Living in the Lower Eastside Neighborhoods of Detroit, Michigan. Health & Place 19, 1-14. v TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF TABLES viii LIST OF FIGURES x CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION 1 CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW 15 Social Ecology 15 Food Deserts 18 Disadvantaged Consumers 25 Neighborhoods 28 Social Ecology, Food Deserts and Metropolitan Detroit 30 Retail Decentralization 32 Economic Restructuring in the Supermarket Industry 34 Conclusion 36 CHAPTER 3 URBAN SUPERMAREKTS, PUBLIC HEALTH OUTCOMES AND TRAVEL PATTERNS 38 Detroit Study Area 39 Data 42 Food Shopping Travel Patterns 47 Dietary-Intake 63 Discussion 68 Conclusion 77 CHAPTER 4 NATIONAL AND REGIONAL SUPERMARKET DECENTRALIZATION IN TRI-COUNTY DETROIT, MICHIGAN (1970-2010) 79 Data & Methods 79 Results 85 Discussion 92 Conclusion 109 vi CHAPTER 5 THE IMPACTS OF NATIONAL AND REGIONAL SUPERMAREKT DECENTRALIZATION ON NEIGHBORHOOD STORE COMPOSITION AND ACCESSIBILITY 111 Data 112 Neighborhood Accessibility and Store Composition Measures 115 Neighborhood Store Composition 120 Neighborhood Store Composition Results 120 Neighborhood Accessibility 128 Neighborhood Cumulative Accessibility Results 130 Coverage/Distance Accessibility Results 135 Discussion 153 Conclusion 163 CHAPTER 6 CONCLUSION 166 Speramus Meliora; Resurget Cineribus 180 Future Research 183 APPENDICES Appendix A: City and Telephone Directories 186 BIBLIOGRAPHY 188 vii LIST OF TABLES Table 3-1: Survey Verses Census Demographics 46 Table 3-2: Repeated Measure and One-Way ANOVAs for Mean Number of Trips by Household Income and Store Type 52 Table 3-3: Difference of Means t-test for Mean Number of Trips between Households Lacking and Having Access to a Vehicle by Store Type 56 Table 3-4: Repeated Measure and One-Way ANOVAs for Mean Number of Trips by Households with no Access to a Vehicle Stratified by Household Income and Store Type 57 Table 3-5: Repeated Measure and One-Way ANOVAs for Mean Number of Trips by Age Cohort and Store Type 59 Table 3-6: Repeated Measure One-Way ANOVAs for Mean Number of Trips by Household Income and Neighborhood Configuration 61 Table 3-7: Negative Binomial Regression Results 66 Table 4-1: Top 5 Tri-County Detroit Study Area National and Regional Supermarkets 1970 to 2010 98 Table 5-1: Store Composition ANOVAs for Census Tract Boundaries 121 Table 5-2: Store Composition ANOVAs for Reconfigured Neighborhoods 124 Table 5-3: National and Regional Supermarket Logistic Regressions (Census Tracts) 127 Table 5-4: National and Regional Supermarket Logistic Regressions (Reconfigured Neighborhoods) 129 Table 5-5: Cumulative Opportunity Accessibility ANOVAs (Census Tracts) 131 Table 5-6: Cumulative Opportunity Accessibility ANOVAs (Reconfigured Neighborhoods) 134 Table 5-7: Coverage Accessibility ANOVAs (Census Tracts) 136 Table 5-8: Coverage Accessibility ANOVAs (Reconfigured Neighborhoods) 139 viii Table 5-9: Mean Distance to the Nearest 5 National and Regional Supermarkets Weighted Least Squares Regressions (Census Tracts) 142 Table 5-10: Minimum Distance to the Nearest National and Regional Supermarket Weighted Least Squares Regression (Census Tracts) 143 Table 5-11: Mean Distance to the Nearest 5 National and Regional Supermarkets Weighted Least Squares Regressions (Reconfigured Neighborhoods) 145 Table 5-12: Minimum Distance to the Nearest National and Regional Supermarket Weighted Least Squares Regression (Reconfigured Neighborhoods) 146 Table 5-13: Mean Distance to the Nearest 5 Liquor Stores Weighted Least Squares Regressions (Census Tracts) 148 Table 5-14: Minimum Distance to the Nearest Liquor Store Weighted Least Squares Regression (Census Tracts) 149 Table 5-15: Mean Distance to the Nearest 5 Liquor Stores Weighted Least Squares Regressions (Reconfigured Neighborhoods) 151 Table 5-16: Minimum