| Course | MPH 506 Environmental Health in Public Health |
|---|---|
| Week | 6 |
| Paper type | Community environmental assessment |
| Length | About 1,170 words, 5 pages |
| Format | APA 7 student paper |
| School | Chamberlain University |
| Program | Master of Public Health (MPH) |
| Updated | October 2026 |
Free sample paper for MPH 506 Week 6
Community Environmental Assessment: Eastgate, the Neighborhood Between Harmon Field and the Highway 9 Truck Route, and the Burdens That Stack There
Student Name
Chamberlain University
MPH 506: Environmental Health in Public Health
Instructor Name
Month Day, Year
Community Environmental Assessment: Eastgate, the Neighborhood Between Harmon Field and the Highway 9 Truck Route, and the Burdens That Stack There
Boundary and Approach
This assessment covers Eastgate, defined as census tracts 104.01 and 104.02 in the composite Brennan County. The tracts run from the east fence of Harmon Field, the county's general aviation airfield, to the Highway 9 truck route about 1.4 kilometers to the east. Using two census tracts as the boundary means that population, housing and health data can attach to the same area, which a boundary drawn by eye cannot offer. The tracts hold about 5,100 residents. The assessment uses cumulative burden as its organizing idea: the question is not which hazard is worst, but what the hazards add up to for the people who live with all of them at once (Morello-Frosch et al., 2011). All local figures are composite values built for this course.
The Built Environment
Housing. About 68% of Eastgate's homes date from before 1950, the era of lead paint. A mobile home park of about 120 units sits 350 meters from the airfield's run-up pad. Many homes are rentals, and the county's code enforcement log records 41 open housing complaints in the tracts, mostly for peeling paint, leaks and mold.
Heat and tree cover. Tree canopy covers about 9% of the tracts, against 24% for the county. Summer surface temperatures measured by the county's 2025 heat mapping were among the highest in the county, especially in the mobile home park and along the truck route, where pavement and metal roofs dominate.
Walking and injury. Fewer than half of Eastgate's streets have continuous sidewalks. Highway 9 carries about 14,000 vehicles a day, many of them trucks serving a distribution center, and there is one signalized crossing in 1.4 kilometers. Three pedestrians were struck on that stretch in the past five years.
Food. The nearest full-service grocery store is 2.4 kilometers away across the highway. Inside the tracts there are two dollar stores and a convenience market.
Monitoring Data Where It Exists
Monitoring is uneven, and that is itself a finding. The county ran a lead monitor at the airfield fence for twelve months in 2025, whose worst three-month stretch averaged 0.09 micrograms of lead per cubic meter of air: under the federal limit, yet far over what a typical city records. The nearest fine particle monitor is 8 kilometers away and does not capture truck traffic on Highway 9. Soil sampling in spring 2026 found a median of 140 parts per million lead in yards within 400 meters of the run-up pad and 60 in yards farther away. There is no noise monitoring, although flight school training patterns pass over the tracts many times a day. A former metal plating shop on Ash Street is listed by the state as a site awaiting assessment.
Table 1
Environmental Hazards and Built Environment Conditions in Eastgate Compared With the County
| Hazard or condition | Measure | Eastgate | County | Data quality |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Airborne lead | Highest three-month average | 0.09 micrograms per cubic meter (fence) | Not monitored elsewhere | One monitor, at fence |
| Soil lead | Median yard sample | 140 ppm near pad; 60 ppm farther | No county survey | 30 yards, composite |
| Housing age | Built before 1950 | 68% | 22% | Census estimate |
| Tree canopy | Share of land area | 9% | 24% | County heat map |
| Food access | Distance to full grocery | 2.4 km | 1.1 km median | Mapped |
| Pedestrian injury | Pedestrians struck, 5 years | 3 on Highway 9 stretch | Not comparable | Police reports |
Note. Note. Composite values constructed for this course; data quality column shows how far each measure can be trusted.
Vulnerability of the Population
About 11% of residents are children under six, higher than the county's 7%. Median household income is about 60% of the county's. Spanish is the main language at home in about four in ten households. Fewer than half of eligible Eastgate children had a blood lead test in 2025. Emergency visits for childhood asthma from the two tracts were about 1.8 times the county rate. These factors matter because they raise the effect of a given exposure: a young child in an old home, with iron deficiency, without a blood lead test, absorbs more lead and is less likely to have it detected. Distance compounds it: in North Carolina, the blood lead effect of living near an airport serving leaded fuel was largest within 500 meters and smaller, though still present, out to 1,000 meters (Miranda et al., 2011), and most of Eastgate lies inside that second ring.
Cumulative Burden, Not a List
Taken one at a time, each condition in Eastgate is moderate. The airfield's air lead is below the national standard. The soil lead in near yards is below EPA's residential screening level of 200 parts per million (U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, 2024). The truck route is busy but not unusual. Each would pass a single-hazard review.
Together, they stack. Lead reaches young children from old paint and from aircraft at the same time, so a level that is acceptable from one source is added to the other. Heat and poor housing raise indoor time with windows open in summer, which brings settled dust indoors. Asthma is worsened by truck exhaust and by heat. Lack of a nearby grocery store makes iron-rich diets harder, which raises lead absorption. And the families least likely to have a child tested are the ones most exposed. Morello-Frosch et al. (2011) argue that cumulative impacts arise from the interaction of environmental hazards with social vulnerability, and that assessments which judge each hazard separately consistently understate them.
How the Distribution Arose
Eastgate's burdens were not random. Harmon Field opened in 1942 as a wartime training field at what was then the edge of town. Small houses were built east of it between 1943 and 1948 for workers at the nearby defense plant, on land that was cheap because it was next to the field. In the 1960s, Highway 9 was widened as a truck route along the neighborhood's eastern side, and the mobile home park was permitted in the 1970s on land that the county's noise contours had made hard to sell for other uses. Each decision followed the previous one: the presence of one burden lowered land values and made the next easier to site there. That pattern, in which land near existing hazards attracts new ones, is how cumulative burden builds up in particular places.
Priorities That Follow
The assessment points to actions that address several burdens at once: relocating the airfield's run-up area away from homes, a blood lead testing campaign for children under six in Spanish and English, lead-safe repairs for rentals with open paint complaints, tree planting along Highway 9 and in the mobile home park, and a second signalized crossing on the truck route.
References
Miranda, M. L., Anthopolos, R., & Hastings, D. (2011). A geospatial analysis of the effects of aviation gasoline on childhood blood lead levels. Environmental Health Perspectives, 119(10), 1513-1516. https://doi.org/10.1289/ehp.1003231
Morello-Frosch, R., Zuk, M., Jerrett, M., Shamasunder, B., & Kyle, A. D. (2011). Understanding the cumulative impacts of inequalities in environmental health: Implications for policy. Health Affairs, 30(5), 879-887. https://doi.org/10.1377/hlthaff.2011.0153
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. (2024). Updated residential soil lead guidance for CERCLA sites and RCRA corrective action facilities. https://www.epa.gov/system/files/documents/2024-01/olem-residential-lead-soil-guidance-2024_signed_508.pdf
What the MPH 506 Week 6 assignment asks for
In week six you assess the environmental health of a defined community. Draw a boundary that data can attach to, such as census tracts. Describe the built environment as well as contamination: housing, heat and tree cover, places to walk, food access and roads. Use monitoring data wherever any has been collected, and be plain about the places with none. Describe the population's vulnerability and how it changes the effect of exposures. Organize the assessment around cumulative burden rather than a list of separate hazards. Explain how the current distribution of burdens arose, with history and evidence. Close with priorities that follow from the assessment rather than generic recommendations, and cite sources for each claim.
How this MPH 506 Week 6 example is built
The boundary is two census tracts from the airfield fence to a highway truck route, about 5,100 residents. Housing age, tree canopy, sidewalks, pedestrian injuries and distance to a grocery store are reported beside airborne and soil lead. A table compares each measure with the county and rates data quality. Vulnerability includes a high share of young children, lower incomes, Spanish-speaking households and low blood lead testing. The cumulative section shows that each hazard alone would pass review but that lead from two sources, heat, truck exhaust and poor food access combine. The history traces wartime housing next to the field, the truck route and a mobile home park sited on noise-affected land.
MPH 506 Week 6 rubric: what full points look like
The heaviest loss in a community assessment is a contamination-only catalog that says nothing about housing, heat, walkability or food. A second is the equity paragraph appended at the end, asserting unfairness without history or evidence. Boundaries drawn so wide that indicators describe a whole county lose precision marks. Hazards listed side by side, with no account of how they combine, miss the cumulative framing the week asks for. Strong assessments set a data-ready boundary, include the built environment, report monitoring data and its gaps, explain vulnerability, show how burdens interact, trace how the distribution arose and end with priorities tied to findings.
Common MPH 506 Week 6 mistakes, and how to avoid them
Community assessments need data from many sources, and gathering them is often the slowest part. If you share the community you are assessing, we can help you choose a boundary that data can attach to, find housing, heat and food access measures and report monitoring gaps honestly. We can also help you write the history section with sources rather than assertion. Your community, data and conclusions remain your own. If your instructor names a mapping tool, tell us which one, and the custom sample will report the indicators that tool provides. Where a tool has been taken offline, we can suggest a current source for the same measure, such as census housing tables or a state health data portal, so the gap does not hold you up.
Get a MPH-506 Week 6 example written to your instructions
Send the Week 6 instructions with the template and data sources your section requires, and a custom example is written to that structure and returned inside 24 to 48 hours. The first one is free. Which community you assess, and which burden you lead on, is usually yours to pick.
More MPH 506 papers and MPH samples
- MPH 506 Week 1: Located Hazard Post
- MPH 506 Week 2: Environmental Hazard Analysis
- MPH 506 Week 3: Exposure Pathway Analysis
- MPH 506 Week 4: Risk Assessment Write-Up
- MPH 506 Week 5: Case Study Analysis
- MPH 506 Week 7: Risk Communication Plan
- MPH 506 Week 8: Policy Brief
- MPH 505 Week 6: Health Campaign Plan
- MPH 504 Week 6: Health Equity Analysis
- MPH 503 Week 6: Coalition Strategy Write-Up
- MPH 500 Week 6: Stakeholder Analysis
MPH 506 Week 6 questions, answered
What if no local monitoring data exists?
Report the absence and treat it as a finding in itself. Communities with no monitoring are frequently the ones carrying the highest burden, and the absence of data is itself a piece of evidence about how the place has been treated. Describe what would need measuring and use whatever regional or modeled data exists, labeled as such.
Why does the built environment belong here?
Because it determines exposure and outcome as much as contamination does. Housing condition drives indoor air quality and injury, tree cover drives heat exposure, road layout drives both air quality and pedestrian risk. An assessment that stops at industrial sources has examined one part of what an environment does to the people in it.
How much history should the equity section carry?
Enough to establish that the pattern has causes rather than being coincidence. Zoning decisions, siting choices and infrastructure investment are usually documented and turn an observation about who bears the burden into an argument about how they came to. Where the record is thin, say what you could establish and what you could not.
Where can I find a free MPH 506 Week 6 sample paper?
This page has the full MPH 506 Week 6 assessment of a composite neighborhood between an airfield and a truck route.
How does the MPH 506 Week 6 sample show cumulative burden?
It shows that each hazard alone would pass review, but lead from paint and aircraft, heat, truck exhaust and poor food access combine for the same families.