MAPPING FOOD ACCESS IN WATERVILLE, MAINE
From left: Colby summer research students Duncan Coles, Julia Nelson, Katie Senechal, Amya Bhalla, Anna Yu and Erica Lei enjoy ice cream at Gifford’s in Waterville, Summer 2017
Colby students Katie Senechal ’19 and Julia Nelson ’19 mapped the entire food environment of Waterville, Maine. For her senior honors thesis, Katie used GIS to map areas of low income and low proximity to grocery stores and other food sites in Waterville, and surveyed residents about their food shopping behaviors. Her research upends myths about certain neighborhoods in Waterville being so-called ‘food deserts’ that simply need more grocery stores to solve food insecurity.
