Walkable Urbanism: The most walkable metros ranked (US)

[mhays]

The US stat is often around 20 sf/person for malls and maybe 43 for all retail. But I agree that our stats aren't reliable, and comparing that to other countries is at least suspect.

But most of the US also makes it very easy to build too much retail, vs. the barriers to entry in other places. That encourages giant stores as well as the leapfrogging/cannibalism effects where buildings are built with the expectation that others will close.

[memph]

So I was able to find the walkUPs for Atlanta.

They include

Part but not all of pre-WWII Atlanta (divided into several contiguous walkUPs) from Colonial Homes to Adair Park/West End to Poncey-Highland

Emerging TODs:
-Perimeter Centre (central portion only though, not the entire area)
-Buckhead (the area around the metro station+the adjacent node at Peachtree & Roswell Rd)
-Lindbergh Centre

Historic centres of former small towns:
-Roswell
-Marietta
-Decatur

University Campus:
-Emory University+CDC

More dubious areas:
-Roswell Drive area in Sandy Springs from Abernathy to The Perimeter
-Cumberland between Cumberland Drive and The Perimeter

[memph]

The WalkUPs for D.C.

Historic town centres of former small towns:
-Frederick
-Alexandria
-Fairfax

New town centres in the suburbs
-Reston (boundaries seem to be Dulles Toll Rd, Fairfax County Pkwy, New Dominion Pkwy and Hidden Creek Golf Club)
-Kentlands/Lakelands

Emerging and established TODs
-Rockville
-North Bethesda
-Wheaton
-Silver Spring
-Bethesda
-Friendship Village
-Rosslyn-Ballston corridor
-Crystal City
-Eisenhower Ave

The most of the core of D.C.
14th St corridor up to Spring Rd and much of L'Enfant's city

A couple more outlying parts of D.C.
-Tenleytown
-Woodley Park
-U of D.C. area

More dubious examples include less developed areas around metro station
-New Carrollton
-Prince Georges Plaza
-Pentagon City

As well as other less developed or under development areas
-National Harbour
-Baileys Crossroads
-Seven Corners
-Annandale

And of course Tysons Corners

[memph]

ok, I was able to find the full list of walkUPs used.

http://business.gwu.edu/creua/includes/foottraffic.pdf

What I've found so far:

New York seems to include most or all of Manhattan, but excludes most of the outer boroughs and much of Union County. It also excludes many smaller towns and walkable suburbs like Perth Amboy, Tarrytown, Port Chester, Bergenfield... It only includes the downtowns of the larger satellite towns/suburbs (Elizabeth, Passaic, Paterson, Newark, Jersey City, White Plains, New Rochelle, Yonkers, Bridgeport, Princeton...).

Philadelphia
Includes some of the more desirable and walkable neighbourhoods of the city, but far from the whole city. Outside the city proper, it includes only the downtowns of West Chester, Phoenixville, Bryn Mawr, Wayne and Ardmore. No Chester, no Camden, no Media, no Conshoken, no Pottstown not even Norristown!

[memph]

So I think excluding much of New York's outer boroughs and small towns while including places like Kentlands, National Harbour and Baileys Crossroads for D.C. is why D.C. ranked higher. Evidence that the analysis probably should have included more for New York is the fact that the average walkscore for New York's walkUPs is 94, compared to 85 for Washington. That's unweighted by size, and taken at the most walkable intersection of each walkUP.

This is the ranked list of %office/retail in walkUPs from the report, and next to it I added the unweighted average walk score (maybe someone can calculate a weighted value if desired) of the most walkable intersection of each walkUP for each city. So Washington probably included a bit too much compared to New York, Boston and San Francisco. Atlanta, Houston and Kansas City probably included too much as well and should rank lower. Philadelphia probably included too little and should rank higher.

Washington 85
New York 94
Boston 93
San Francisco 93
Chicago 88
Seattle 94
Portland 93
Atlanta 81
Pittsburgh 89
Cleveland 86
Baltimore 88
Minneapolis 90
Philadelphia 94
Denver 89
Houston 81
Columbus 85
Kansas City 82
Los Angeles 89
St. Louis 87
Cincinnati 90
Sacramento 88
Detroit 87
Miami 88
San Diego 92
Dallas 85
Las Vegas 80
San Antonio 90
Tampa 85
Phoenix 85
Orlando 88

[Shawn]

^--- The Boston Metro measurements included Plymouth and Gloucester, but didn't include Somerville outside of Davis Square, Brookline (?!?), Chelsea, Revere, Everett, Winthrop . . . basically all of the super-walkable, 10,000+ pp sq mile inner ring burbs. Malden but not Medford or Arlington? Uh...

If anything, it looks like the Tier One metros were "under-measured".

[memph]

Originally Posted by Shawn

^--- The Boston Metro measurements included Plymouth and Gloucester, but didn't include Somerville outside of Davis Square, Brookline (?!?), Chelsea, Revere, Everett, Winthrop . . . basically all of the super-walkable, 10,000+ pp sq mile inner ring burbs. Malden but not Medford or Arlington? Uh...

If anything, it looks like the Tier One metros were "under-measured".

My guess is either those areas have less than 300k sf of retail, or they just messed up.

[mhays]

300,000 sf of retail will often favor a place with a "power center" or "lifestyle" mall, and omit a lot of walkable urban districts that are more about small stores.

[Tom Servo]

Chicago is less walkable than Houston, Phoenix, LA, Tampa, Denver, Detroit, Atlanta, and Miami?

Laughing my fucking ass off. What a garbage article.

Neither Houston, Phoenix, Tampa, Detroit, Atlanta, Miami, Dallas, nor ORLANDO belong on any list ranking the top walkable, urban cities. Especially the auto-centric, suburban Sun Belt cities.

The way I see it, the ONLY walkable US cities (despite whatever dumbass index measurements you wanna use) are:
NYC. Chicago. Boston. Philly. DC. San Fran. And to a far lesser extent, LA. Seattle. And Portland.

[jd3189]

^^^ That list is just a future projection of US metro walkability. I don't know about Houston, Phoenix, Denver, or Tampa, but LA is currently on its way to becoming very walkable with a lot of transit opportunities and Detroit(already with roughly the same Rustbelt infrastructure as Chicago) is slowly stabilizing. Plus Atlanta and Miami will become very walkable in the future if their growth continues, the latter more-so since the South Florida metro pretty much has a pretty good template for walkability to vastly develop in comparison to other Sunbelt cities.

[Wizened Variations]

I remember, when I was in my early 30s, that to learn how a place works walk a lot and take public transportation.

It's like looking for a house.

I drove my wife nuts because I put 10,000 miles on a car looking a Denver neighborhoods at selected times between during the day and night. I went through scenario after scenario, and, an entire range of purchase prices that I could afford (the upper range would hurt more, but would have more positives). I found a lot of jewels- great little neighborhoods, some with a foot print as small as 2 square blocks. As I narrowed down my choices, I went out and walked them at different times of the day as well as during different seasons.

Walkability is very difficult to determine unless you walk a neighborhood. I mean walk it! Houses that are amiable to foot traffic, tend to be good neighborhoods for walkers.

As a wise teacher told me years ago when I was discovered plagiarizing and received an "F", "What do you expect if someone else does the work?"

Also, if you ride bikes, ride bikes in a neighborhood at different times of day. Ride to a supermarket from where you might want to live. Can you get to the post office on your bike and would you want to? Do I have to take my bike somewhere to ride or can I ride in my neighborhood?

[ziet911]

Originally Posted by Tom Servo

Chicago is less walkable than Houston, Phoenix, LA, Tampa, Denver, Detroit, Atlanta, and Miami?

Laughing my fucking ass off. What a garbage article.

Neither Houston, Phoenix, Tampa, Detroit, Atlanta, Miami, Dallas, nor ORLANDO belong on any list ranking the top walkable, urban cities. Especially the auto-centric, suburban Sun Belt cities.

The way I see it, the ONLY walkable US cities (despite whatever dumbass index measurements you wanna use) are:
NYC. Chicago. Boston. Philly. DC. San Fran. And to a far lesser extent, LA. Seattle. And Portland.

Houston is a most UNWALKABLE city along with all the small center core massive suburban sprawl cities of the west......maybe these pollsters need to take a reality pill?

[dave8721]

Originally Posted by memph

So I think excluding much of New York's outer boroughs and small towns while including places like Kentlands, National Harbour and Baileys Crossroads for D.C. is why D.C. ranked higher. Evidence that the analysis probably should have included more for New York is the fact that the average walkscore for New York's walkUPs is 94, compared to 85 for Washington. That's unweighted by size, and taken at the most walkable intersection of each walkUP.

This is the ranked list of %office/retail in walkUPs from the report, and next to it I added the unweighted average walk score (maybe someone can calculate a weighted value if desired) of the most walkable intersection of each walkUP for each city. So Washington probably included a bit too much compared to New York, Boston and San Francisco. Atlanta, Houston and Kansas City probably included too much as well and should rank lower. Philadelphia probably included too little and should rank higher.

Washington 85
New York 94
Boston 93
San Francisco 93
Chicago 88
Seattle 94
Portland 93
Atlanta 81
Pittsburgh 89
Cleveland 86
Baltimore 88
Minneapolis 90
Philadelphia 94
Denver 89
Houston 81
Columbus 85
Kansas City 82
Los Angeles 89
St. Louis 87
Cincinnati 90
Sacramento 88
Detroit 87
Miami 88
San Diego 92
Dallas 85
Las Vegas 80
San Antonio 90
Tampa 85
Phoenix 85
Orlando 88

Where do they get the walk scores from? The scores they give for walkups are absolutely not the highest walk score in those walkup areas. Look more like the walk score given for some random intersection, maybe in the geographical center of the walkup? They say it is at the "100% intersection" but I don't see them defining that term anywhere. The numbers quoted look more like averages across the walkup area.

[memph]

Originally Posted by ziet911

Houston is a most UNWALKABLE city along with all the small center core massive suburban sprawl cities of the west......maybe these pollsters need to take a reality pill?

Most of those cities don't rank very well. Among those, Houston is the one that did the best, but it's still around the middle of the list, below the cities of the NE, Chicago, Portland, Seattle and San Francisco.

DC, Atlanta, Miami and Seattle probably do deserve to be near the top of the list of cities that are rapidly become more urban.

What surprises me more is that apparently only 8 of the top 30 cities have increased their share of retail+office in walkUPs, and that 11 cities actually experienced a net decline, including Los Angeles, New York and Minneapolis.

[memph]

Originally Posted by dave8721

Where do they get the walk scores from? The scores they give for walkups are absolutely not the highest walk score in those walkup areas. Look more like the walk score given for some random intersection, maybe in the geographical center of the walkup? They say it is at the "100% intersection" but I don't see them defining that term anywhere. The numbers quoted look more like averages across the walkup area.

Look in end notes

3.
Walk Score is the most common ranking of
walkability available
.
Walk Score assigns every
address and many neighborhoods a score
from 0 to 100
.
This score reflects a pedestrian’s
ability to reach a variety of daily destinations
within walking distance
.
For full methodology,
see
www
.
walkscore
.
com/methodology
.
shtml
.
The 2012 Brookings methodology defines a
WalkUP as having an average minimum Walk
Score of 70
.
5 across its acreage
.
This research
uses a Walk Score of 70 or greater at the most
walkable intersection, because it was easier to
obtain and apply across 30 metros
.

But you're right, the walk scores they gave don't match the ones on walkscore's website.

[Evergrey]

I'll take the Census Bureau numbers over this muddled, over-complicated nonsense (or Tom Servo's opinions).

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/...72c_story.html

States in the Northeast had the highest rate of walking to work, at 4.7 percent of workers. Among large cities, Boston was the highest walking-to-work city at 15.1 percent. The District ranked second (12.1 percent), followed by Pittsburgh (11.3), New York (10.3), San Francisco (9.9), Madison (9.1), Seattle (9.1), Honolulu (9.0), Philadelphia (8.6) and Jersey City (8.5). Baltimore ranked 12th at 6.5 percent.

[Private Dick]

Originally Posted by Tom Servo

The way I see it, the ONLY walkable US cities (despite whatever dumbass index measurements you wanna use) are:
NYC. Chicago. Boston. Philly. DC. San Fran. And to a far lesser extent, LA. Seattle. And Portland.

Baltimore? Pittsburgh? Cleveland? New Orleans? Buffalo? These cities, and others, are all eminently "walkable"... with significant portions of the cores and outlying urban areas consisting of dense, well-connected neighborhoods. Are there varying levels of overall "walkability"? Sure, but if you're including cities like LA, Seattle, and especially Portland in your "ONLY" list, then you'd have to include a number of others as well.

Originally Posted by jd3189

Plus Atlanta and Miami will become very walkable in the future if their growth continues, the latter more-so since the South Florida metro pretty much has a pretty good template for walkability to vastly develop in comparison to other Sunbelt cities.

Miami's density does help to offer a workable template, but that template is highly suburban-styled... with many major N-S and E-W multi-lane, very long, straight, and wide, pancake-flat thoroughfares dominating the built environment immediately outside of the downtown core. That's not an easy template to work with since by design it encourages in a number of ways getting in a car to go anywhere outside of your immediate surroundings -- actually not only encouraging, but in many cases, forcing one to do so. It will not be easy... the lack of topographic changes really made it so easy to simply lay out long, wide streets across the landscape... resulting in what amounts to a "street scene" dominated by ground-level highways passing through the greater city.

[mhays]

The walk-to-work ratings are pretty useful. Private, see the previous post.

But this thread is about metros, not core cities. So metro walk-to-work numbers would be more parallel.

[simms3_redux]

Transit also ties into walkability. In most cases, a train or bus won't provide door to door service. Is transit in a particular city Park N Ride, or do people walk to a bus/train stop, ride, and then walk to office? In my case, I walk 5 blocks to a more convenient bus, then walk 2 blocks to the office. On the opposite route, I walk 1 block to bus, then 6 blocks back to apartment. Overall, excluding lunch and other things throughout the day, I am walking up and down 10 floors of apartments (5 x 2) and 14 city blocks to ride transit. I don't think much about it, but I bet that alone is more exercise than the average American gets in a day, lol. I wouldn't check the "walk" to work box on a Census survey, but rather the transit box, however, I'm still walking a good bit in order to get to work.

Newer sunbelt cities are setting up transit systems that are much more Park N Ride with relatively minimal walking to and from stations. In older cities, it's understood that transit doesn't stand on its own, but that one will probably have to do a bit of walking, and that's more than OK.

[Private Dick]

Originally Posted by mhays

The walk-to-work ratings are pretty useful. Private, see the previous post.

But this thread is about metros, not core cities. So metro walk-to-work numbers would be more parallel.

I think rating metro areas in these terms often proves to be a difficult, if not dubious, exercise... since metro areas differ in ways that are nearly impossible to quantify... and very often consist of satellite urban/quasi-urban cores which may in fact score moderately high to high on walk scores, even though the overall metro area could be considered far from "walkable"... and thus skewing rankings significantly.