food deserts

How are food deserts, concerts and lightbulbs related? LX News storyteller Cody Broadway connects the dots — touching on Farm Aid concerts, the growing problem of “food swamps” and the invention of the LED lightbulb.

If you drive down Figueroa Street in Los Angeles, you’ll notice a car dealership, a music school, a Taco Bell, a McDonald’s, a gas station, a Jack in the Box, and a Popeyes. That’s what Dr. Deborah Cohen, a research scientist at Kaiser Permanente who lives in Los Angeles, would call a “food swamp.” “We live in environments where...

While Tops is temporarily closed during the investigation, the community is working to make sure residents don’t go without.

Millions of Americans struggle to access fresh and affordable groceries every day. The areas they live in are most often called “food deserts,” but academics and activists use another term they say better reflects the systemic racism that created them. That term is “food apartheid.” Here’s how food apartheid plays out in Chicago — and how local community members are...