Posted on: Sunday, August 18, 2002

COMMENTARY
Have a burger and your waistline, too

By John Goody

Caesar Barber is suing because fast food has made him fat, and he says it's not his fault.

He is one of 108 million Americans who are overweight or obese.

We are, in fact, carrying a substantial energy reserve about our collective middles. As Hawai'i is excessively dependent on imported foreign fuel, it seems only patriotic to ask how we might put our share of this relatively untapped and largely unwanted energy reserve to good use.

Consider Barber. Let's say, for the sake of argument, that he drives a Ford Expedition. You know the one, it darkens the sky when it drives past, takes up two (compact car only) parking spaces. I doubt Barber would walk or bike a couple miles to the store; he'd rather drive his Expedition.

At its rated 12 mpg for city driving, his Expedition consumes a third of a gallon of gas for the round-trip. Let's quantify the energy used in terms to which Barber would no doubt relate. The energy content of a gallon of gas is roughly 31,520 large calories. Your basic cheeseburger has 320 of these same calories.

In driving to the store and back, Barber has expended the energy equivalent of 32 cheeseburgers. Fortunately for him, he didn't have to stuff those burgers into his gas tank, although on the road, one may have found its way into his mouth.

Now, suppose our man had walked or biked. The good news is, he wouldn't need to eat 32 cheeseburgers to do it. At a leisurely biking pace of 12 mph, he can do it with half a cheeseburger, in roughly 20 minutes. Not bad. And, if he were to walk at a brisk pace, it would require a bit more than one cheeseburger, and a bit more than an hour, round-trip. If he didn't actually eat the additional cheeseburger, the energy used would come from under his belt.

Over the period of a year, walking or biking three times a week for an hour, rather than driving a corresponding distance, Barber would work off the equivalent of 145 to 178 cheeseburgers, the body weight equivalent of 13 to 16 pounds. That's good for him, and for the rest of us, too. By getting out of his Expedition for these short trips, Barber would avoid emitting 1,081 pounds of greenhouse gases, and save 52 gallons of gasoline (at four miles per trip, three times a week for a year). So, other than the fact that he might just prefer sitting on his behind and blaming Jack for his belly, why doesn't he get out of the car and walk?

Perhaps he would complain: "It's not safe." Nothing is 100 percent safe, but the alternative risks are worth a look. Fifty-four percent of us are overweight; 20 percent obese. The risk of heart attack is elevated by one-third for those who are overweight and double for the obese. Nationwide, there are more than 500,000 heart-attack deaths annually, and more than a million new cases of heart disease.

Compare these numbers to accident statistics for walking and cycling. In 2000, among 85 million cyclists, there were roughly 700 cycling deaths nationwide. And there were about 5,000 pedestrian deaths. Is it more risky to be overweight and sedentary or to walk and bike?

It is possible to have your waistline and eat a burger, too. Rather than sue McDonald's because he got fat, Barber should consider spending more time walking around. In Honolulu, we are lucky to have some good places to do that. To their credit, the current city administration and members of the City Council have supported efforts to make Honolulu a more people-friendly city, with well-considered projects that favor transit, walking and biking. They know we have to provide alternatives to the automobile if we are to keep Honolulu a livable, healthful city.

Yet our elected leaders are having a hard time bucking the strident voices of those wedded to the car. Whether it's Bus Rapid Transit, Diamond Head Road, the Ala Wai Promenade or neighborhood "traffic calming," the resistance from a loud minority is astounding, even to the simple and moral imperative of slowing speeding cars in residential areas for the safety of fellow residents.

Government leaders need our support for projects that foster alternatives to the car. Now, when more of us are overweight and suffering related health problems, streets and highways are clogged by cars, fuel supplies are at risk from international unrest and sea levels are rising from global warming. Support for such projects is becoming imperative.

The right answer is obvious, but entrenched interests of the automobile are hard to budge. We have no way to know what tomorrow will bring on the world stage, but we do know that one way or the other, we'll need to get to work on Monday morning. And regardless of the outcome of Barber's lawsuit or the supply of fuel, we'll always be able to count on the energy in those cheeseburgers to get us there.

John Goody is a director of the Hawaii Bicycling League and its community affairs chairman.