In US cities, neighborhoods have long been racially segregated. However, people do not spend all their time in their neighborhoods, and the consequences of residential segregation may be tempered by the contact people have with other racial groups as they traverse the city daily. We examine the extent to which people’s regular travel throughout the city is to places “beyond their comfort zone” (BCZ), i.e., to neighborhoods of racial composition different from their own—and why. Based on travel patterns observed in more than 7.2 million devices in the 100 largest US cities, we find that the average trip is to a neighborhood less than half as racially different from the home neighborhood as it could have been given the city. Travel to grocery stores is least likely to be BCZ; travel to gyms and parks, most likely; however, differences are greatest across cities. For the first ~10 km people travel from home, neighborhoods become increasingly more BCZ for every km traveled; beyond that point, whether neighborhoods do so depends strongly on the city. Patterns are substantively similar before and after COVID-19. Our findings suggest that policies encouraging more 15-min travel—that is, to amenities closer to the home—may inadvertently discourage BCZ movement. In addition, promoting use of certain “third places” such as restaurants, bars, and gyms, may help temper the effects of residential segregation, though how much it might do so depends on city-specific conditions.

中文翻译：

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人们如何接触与自己种族不同的社区


在美国城市，社区长期以来一直存在种族隔离。然而，人们不会把所有的时间都花在自己的社区里，而且人们每天穿过城市时与其他种族群体的接触可能会缓和居住隔离的后果。我们研究了人们在整个城市的定期旅行中去往“超出他们的舒适区”（BCZ）的地方的程度，即去往种族构成与他们自己不同的社区，以及原因。根据在美国 100 个最大城市的超过 720 万台设备中观察到的出行模式，我们发现，平均出行地点的种族差异与家乡社区的种族差异不到该城市的一半。前往杂货店的可能性最小的是 BCZ；最有可能去健身房和公园；然而，不同城市之间的差异最大。对于人们从家出发的最初约 10 公里，每行驶一公里，社区就会变得越来越 BCZ；除此之外，社区是否这样做在很大程度上取决于城市。 COVID-19 之前和之后的模式基本相似。我们的研究结果表明，鼓励更多 15 分钟出行（即前往离家较近的便利设施）的政策可能会无意中阻碍 BCZ 的出行。此外，促进使用某些“第三场所”，如餐馆、酒吧和健身房，可能有助于减轻居住隔离的影响，尽管其效果取决于城市的具体情况。