Does Proximity to Parks and Open Areas Affect Land Values in Georgetown, TX?

To Swim or Not to Swim?

Though winter will soon be here in Georgetown, it is never bad to think ahead! In this map I looked at parks relatively close to Southwestern University and if the parks permitted swimming or not. To do this I took data from the Georgetown Parks and Recreation website and used it to determine what the rules regarding swimming are in each park. I then narrowed down the search just to parks that are both close to Southwestern and have a viable water source to swim in during the warmer months. The Landrum Memorial Fountain on campus will always be a mystery as there is no evidence either condoning or condemning swimming in it.  

Everything's BIGGER in Texas, Especially Chicken Consumption...

Since being a student at Southwestern University and becoming a semi-permanent resident of Georgetown, Texas, I have come to realize that the large majority of fast food restaurants around the area serve quite a lot of chicken. Before, as a Californian native and resident, I have never seen so much chicken available to us, human consumers; yet, of course, this could just be because I have never come to recognize the abundance of chicken in fast food establishments until now. However, I still feel like hearty meals of chicken are much more greatly sought after out here in Texas than my home of California. I mean, seriously, there are five fried chicken fast food restaurants in the relatively small Georgetown area that sell almost solely chicken meals to consumers: two Golden Fried Chicken restaurants, a Bush’s Fried Chicken restaurant, a Wingstop, and a Kentucky Fried Chicken. Let alone the other 30-something fast food restaurants that also sell some amount chicken in their menus within this area. Back in my hometown of Garden Grove, we only had Kentucky Fried Chicken to supply for this obvious human desire for glorious chicken meat, yet that one main distributor of chicken seemed to be enough for our town. I believe that southern culture has become accustom to love the eating all kinds of chicken, in which the city of Georgetown, and many other southern cities, are attributed with. Therefore, the fast food restaurants of the area hold true to this cultural characteristic and help provide for the high demand that comes with this southern obsession for eating chickens. For within our capitalistic society the following is true: the higher public demand for a product, the greater availability of that product.

In this observation and belief is where I was inspired to make this map of the majority of fast food restaurants who server chicken in the city of Georgetown that I, and many other students of SU, are bound to find or have found ourselves at frequently to feast. This map has geocoded the addresses of these restaurants, labeling them throughout this map of Georgetown with little chicken heads. As you can see from the legend: the largest heads represent those fast food restaurants that sell almost solely chicken (Golden Fried Chicken, KFC, etc.), the middle sized chicken head represents those restaurants whose menus sell a majority of chicken entrées compared to other options (McDonalds, Jack in the Box, etc.), and the smallest chicken head show those restaurants that sell a minority of chicken entrées from their menus (Dairy Queen, Schlotzky’s, etc.). I had received this fast food restaurant information from the Yellow Pages website, and the menu information came from the restaurant’s websites. This map gives a good representation of the magnitude of chicken being sold and consumed constantly in the city of Georgetown. My hopes for this map are to raise human awareness of this over-consumption of these plump, flightless birds; and, with that, help people to realize the variety of negative effects that this intensive demand and over-consumption has on the chickens, human beings, and the entire world. I love eating chicken just as much as the next person, however I have always been one to be wary of glutinous indulgence; as such I try to follow an ethic of moderation and I wholeheartedly recommend this lifestyle choice to everyone who views my map.