Correlations between obesity and driving, and others

GOOD Magazine recently published a table ranking all 50 states and Washington DC in terms of actual levels of driving, walking, cycling, mass transit usage, and levels of obesity. From their table, I plotted all 10 possible correlations of the variables with each other. Note that the driving rank and obesity rank is opposite that of the other things; i.e. a driving rank of 1 means little driving, while a walking rank of 1 means lots of walking. An obesity rank of 1 means low levels of obesity (in this data, Colorado). Our state is indicated with the extra large marker in these plots.

The strongest correlation is between walking and driving, and is depicted here. The more people drive, the less people walk.

Book Reviews

I have recently purchased a couple of books on cycling and advocacy. My goal is in my spare time (ha!) to read both books and summarize them chapter by chapter here. Hopefully this will get some good dialogue going as well.

The first book I'll take a crack at is The Cyclist's Manifesto - The Case for Riding on Two Wheels Instead of Four - by Robert Hurst.

Mr. Hurst is a bicyle messager with over 20,000 hours of cycling in heavy traffic with over 200,000 miles logged on his bicycle. He lives in Denver, Colorado.

Chapter 1 entitled Interesting Times covers the rise and fall of oil/gas prices during 2008/2009. He talks about how Americans are addicted to the automobile and the idea of the independance an automobile gives one.

Mr. Hurst also admits that the bicycle will not solve the worlds energy problems. But on an individual level - the bicycle can transform lives.

Perhaps in Chapter 2 we will get a better understanding of what he means by that.

stay tuned.