Transportation | May 12, 2011 |
11 Most Walk-Friendly U.S. Cities
by Zachary Shahan
The Pedestrian and Bicycle Information Center (PBIC) recently announced the country’s 11 most Walk Friendly Communities based on factors related to safety, mobility, access and comfort.
It’s nice to see this, the League of American Bicyclists has been handing out bicycle-friendly community awards for years, but comprehensive, standardized analyses of walkability have been lacking. Nice to see PBIC pick up on this and do the analyses.
Check out the US’ top pedestrian communities on the following pages, arranged according to award level (Bronze, Silver, Gold, or Platinum), with some extra info on each city via PBIC (much more info is available on the PBIC city pages linked to each city name):
Bronze Walkable Communities
The Safe Routes to School program in Austin benefits from, and works in tandem with, the Public Works Child Safety Program. These programs not only provide pedestrian safety education to children, but also to adults. The Child Safety Program employs 4 safety trainers and targets drivers, parents, teachers, and students in a comprehensive pedestrian safety education program. Austin also encourages people to use alternative modes of transportation through a Walk, Bike, & Roll program.
Austin’s Walk Texas! program promotes walking as a method of managing and preventing chronic diseases, particularly Type II diabetes. Using a community-based approach, the program seeks to change behaviors, policies, and environments to encourage healthier lifestyles for Austinites. The program also includes a challenge whereby residents keep track of their walking mileage to reach the equivalent of walking across the state, which has created a friendly competition around walking in the community.
By providing two dedicated pedestrian planner positions in the city, Charlotte has demonstrated its commitment to pedestrian transportation. Other staff also spend substantial amounts of time working on pedestrian safety issues.
In 2006, Charlotte adopted its Urban Street Design Guidelines, which seek to implement elements of Complete Streets throughout the city. These guidelines provide mobility for motorists, while also ensuring the comfort and safety for pedestrians, bicyclists, and transit users. In addition to supporting transportation objectives, these guidelines support better linkages between land uses, urban design, and transportation to create a unified system encouraging all modes of transportation in Charlotte.
Flagstaff demonstrates its commitment to being a Walk Friendly Community through its staff attention to pedestrian issues. The City has a bicycle and pedestrian coordinator, an active pedestrian advocacy group, and a Pedestrian Advisory Committee.
Flagstaff is home to a popular and extensive trail system called the Flagstaff Urban Trail System that currently has over 50 miles of trails, with more than 80 more miles planned.
Flagstaff Walks! is a weeklong event organized by the Pedestrian Advisory Committee and dedicated to celebrating Flagstaff’s walkable nature and raising awareness of walkability issues. Activities include Safe Routes to School Workshops and Walkability Audits, guided walks, and promotional events, all culminating in International Walk to School Day.
Wilsonville is an excellent example of a rapidly-growing suburban community taking steps to make itself more walkable. Situated along a commuter-heavy interstate and nearly tripling its population since 1990, Wilsonville adopted a pedestrian and bicycle plan in 2006 to help manage effective transportation around the City. Following the recommendations in the plan, Wilsonville hired a full-time Bicycle and Pedestrian Coordinator and formed a Bicycle and Pedestrian Task Force. This is indicative of the level of community support for pedestrian planning in Wilsonville and the City is well-situated to continue improving its pedestrian environment.
Silver Walkable Communities
- The desire to reduce single-occupant vehicle travel is represented in the 2010 adoption of a model Complete Streets policy. This policy states that “all street projects…shall be designed and executed in a balanced, responsible, and equitable way to accommodate and encourage travel by bicyclists, public transportation vehicles and their passengers, and pedestrians of all ages and abilities.” It also states that the City “recognizes bicycle, pedestrian, and transit modes as integral elements of the transportation system.”
- Charlottesville has excellent transit services, provided by Charlottesville Area Transit and University Transit Services. Transit is available within a 1/4 mile of 95 percent of the population seven days a week and operates at 95 percent on time performance. This ensures that residents of Charlottesville have ample opportunity to access high quality transit that serves a variety of destinations.
- With little remaining vacant land, the City has established excellent zoning policies that have resulted in infill accounting for 100 percent of development over the last five years. These policies include providing density bonuses for the inclusion of affordable housing, requiring ground floor commercial uses in mixed use districts, and allowing accessory dwelling units in almost all residential districts.
- In 1975, Charlottesville closed eight blocks of the downtown permanently and created the highly successful Downtown Pedestrian Mall. The mixed use mall on the historic Main Street is home to over 150 businesses situated in rehabilitated historic buildings. A recent construction and redevelopment project ensures that the mall will remain an active pedestrian destination in the heart of the City for years to come.
- Decatur is designating walkability as a top priority for the community and this is clear in the parking management. With no minimum parking requirements for the downtown, Decatur is actively pursuing a “park once” strategy, using priced public parking in garages and on-street meters, requiring parking to be under or behind uses, developing shared parking ordinances, and prohibiting drive-throughs.
- Decatur’s commitment to walking is evident in the training opportunities provided for staff. In addition to the quarterly trainings and webinars on pedestrian and bicycle issues hosted by the Georgia DOT, the city also hosts workshops regularly sends staff to present at and attend conferences such as Pro Walk / Pro Bike, which has resulted in updated ordinances, increased interest in Safe Routes to School, and using a Health Impact Assessment on the City’s transportation plan.
- The City actively promotes walking through a number of outreach efforts and public events. Decatur has entered “Team Decatur” with up to 134 community members in fitness events, resulting in the “Most Fit City” award and active walking programs for citizens. The City also partnered with Kaiser Permanente to hold a large kick-off event in Old Courthouse Square, the City’s preeminent public space. In 2011, Decatur is holding a Walk for Lunch event, which provides participants with walking maps and lunch on event days. In November and December, the City partners with local businesses to hold Terrific Thursdays, which provides free Pedicabs, later store hours, and discounts at businesses. This highlights the relationship between pedestrian-friendly environments and improved business performance. Decatur also holds events like Car Free Day, art walks, farmers markets, and free concerts on the square.
- In crafting the Community Transportation Plan, the City made outstanding use of a number of evaluation tools to project demands and prioritize needs. Latent demand scores estimated the potential future demand for pedestrian facilities while pedestrian level of service indexed the current facilities’ condition. These were combined with a policy and regulatory audit and public feedback from previous plans to develop priorities and goals for the most recent plan.
Gold Walkable Communities
- Ann Arbor stands out among other cities by its focus on creating a walking environment that is comfortable and attractive. Among other amenities, Ann Arbor provides sidewalk furniture, planters, wayfinding signage, fountains, and information kiosks. They also stipulate that 1 percent of city funds must go to public art, which makes walking an interesting and worthwhile activity in the city.
- Among the many great programs in Ann Arbor, the Ann Arbor Transportation Program operates the Ann Arbor Safe Streets and Sidewalks Taskforce, which brings stakeholders together around pedestrian safety issues. The diversity of the group is noteworthy in particular and includes city employees, law enforcement, public health, transportation officials, public relations personnel, legal staff, university officials, and pedestrian advocates.
- Ann Arbor’s journey to work walking mode share is substantially higher than the US average. This is certainly due, in part, to the fact that 98 percent of arterial roads have sidewalks on both sides and 82 percent of non-arterial roads have sidewalks on both sides. Ann Arbor has done a great job putting the infrastructure in place to create a safe walking environment.
- Providing crossing amenities is clearly a priority in Ann Arbor. Aside from strengthening pedestrian ordinances to require drivers to stop for pedestrians in/or approaching crosswalks, they also have a crossing location prioritization scheme, regularly maintain crosswalks, employ in-road stop/yield signs, and implement advance stop/yield lines and raised crosswalks. The focus on pedestrian crossing amenities highlights the commitment to pedestrian safety in Ann Arbor.
- Traffic calming initiatives are also strong in Ann Arbor. Using a neighborhood based program, the city has met with success in reducing speeds along residential streets by employing speed humps, chokers, traffic circles, road diets, and raised intersections among others.
- Arlington’s goal of developing as a dense, transit-oriented community required strategic management of parking and the policies the community has implemented showcase a superb understanding of market-based parking management. Parking costs are unbundled from housing and public on-street spaces are provided at minimal cost to car sharing programs like Zipcar, which reduces the need for private automobiles. For commercial development, below-grade parking is the norm and Arlington also encourages shared parking between uses. The community also provides cash-out incentives, providing employees that do not require a parking space with monetary compensation.
- Arlington is achieving great success in walkability due, in large part, to what one transportation planning official called a “voracious appetite for understanding best pedestrian planning practices around the world.” Training and educational opportunities include webinars and conferences from nearly 20 different groups as well as in person training workshops. Staff is also given a regular refresher course on pedestrian safety on “Safety Day”.
- Arlington’s education and encouragement programs are incredibly important in fostering community support for walkability. The community runs a number of innovative programs that engage community members, including Street Smart, the Car Free Diet, and the Neighborhood 25 campaign.
- Street Smart is a public awareness and enforcement campaign in its sixth year that uses print, outdoor, online, and broadcast media channels throughout the metropolitan Washington area to reach a diverse audience.
- The Car Free Diet program is an innovative development aimed at raising awareness of the health, environmental, financial, and commuting benefits of going car-free or car-lite. Through web, video, blogs, social media, transit advertising, a Car-Free Diet Calculator, and media outreach, the campaign has generated significant media and public attention and garnered substantial support from local businesses.
- The Neighborhood 25 program is a new campaign that began in 2010 as a response to the difference in fatal crashes that occur at 20mph and 30mph. Neighbors voluntarily place “Keep Kids Alive – Drive 25" signs throughout the neighborhoods in conjunction with police placement of speed feedback signs. Police will follow up with additional data collection after the signs are removed to verify the success of the program.
- In an effort to solicit more specific public input, Arlington began holding Walking Town Meetings in 2007. Through local civic associations, communities can take Arlington Board members and staff on a walking tour of the neighborhood to highlight issues of concern, ideas for improvements, and to showcase the community. Following the meeting, planning staff documents the issues that were presented as information and possible alternatives for consideration by the Board.
More Gold Walkable Communities
- As a neighbor to New York City, the City of Hoboken benefits from the services of three regional transit systems and one city agency. Ninety-nine percent of its population lives within a quarter mile of a bus stop or a half-mile from a rail stop, which is highlighted in the city’s 57 percent transit and 10 percent walking mode share.
- Corner Cars, Hoboken’s citywide car-sharing program, seeks to curb demand for parking rather than increasing supply. They have a fleet of 42 vehicles, each of which is parked on a corner for maximum visibility. Ninety percent of Hoboken residents live within a 3–5 minute walk from a car. Their studies have shown that for each Corner Car, 17 households have given up their car and an additional 20 have delayed or avoided the purchase of a car.
- Hoboken Summer Streets is a program that closes a large segment of Sinatra Drive (the waterfront boulevard) to motor-vehicle traffic every Sunday from Memorial Day to Labor Day.
- Unveiled in the Fall of 2010, “Surrender Your Permit” incentivizes residents with residential parking permits to turn them in in exchange for a package of rewards valued at $500/month. Part of the program encourages walking through partnership with a local shoe store that offers pedometers, athletic socks, and discounts on athletic shoes.
- Ninety-nine percent of the city’s arterials are lined with sidewalks on both sides. Four miles of new sidewalks are planned in the next three years.
- The city’s Pedestrian Master Plan highlights “paseos” — pedestrian-oriented shopping streets that were created after the removal of parking lanes behind businesses in 1969. The paseos’ initial success as parking pass-throughs and additional retail frontage has motivated the city to highlight their maintenance and expansion in the plan. Although one chapter covers the paseos within the plan, the chapter functions as a standalone document focused on the network and complimenting the goals, policies, and strategies of the General Plan and Urban Design Guidelines.
- The Circulation Element of Santa Barbara’s General Plan is acomplete streets document. The Element lists four goals and three of them highlight this philosophy: Strive to Achieve Equality of Choice Among Modes; Increase the Availability and Use of Transit; and Increase Bicycling as a Transportation Mode.
- Santa Barbara has a model Safe Routes to School Program already implemented with increasing participation from schools. Currently, the Master Plan has maps of safe routes for all 16 schools in the city limits. They host a Walk to School Day in October, encourage regular walking to school through a friendly competition called the Walk & Roll to School Challenge, produce and disseminate SRTS maps to parents at the beginning of each school year, partner with COAST in teaching how to drive a walking school bus, track walking and biking to school during homeroom time, and perform School Hazard Assessments every three years. Only six percent of schools do not participate in SRTS programming.
- SantaBarbaraCarFree is a project of the Santa Barbara Air Pollution Control District with support from the City of Santa Barbara, Amtrak California, and other partners. It encourages car-free travel through discounts and by providing information on walkable destinations like the Farmers Markets, parks, trails, and bus and shuttle services.
1 Platinum Walkable Community
- One of the main reasons Seattle’s Pedestrian Master Plan is such a successful document is the clear establishment of goals and measurable performance indicators. With the objective of becoming the country’s most walkable city, Seattle established baseline measurements, performance targets, and data collection processes to improve walkability. These indicators fit into the four main goals of the plan: Safety, Equity, Vibrancy, and Health and contain such examples as reaching ten new schools a year with outreach and increasing pedestrian volumes in selected count locations.
- Managing parking is one of the keys to promoting a safe and enjoyable pedestrian environment. Beginning in 1986, Seattle abolished parking minimum standards for the downtown, opting instead to implement a 1 space per 1,000 square feet of non-residential development. Further, parking must be inside, behind, or beside buildings and any parking requirements can be waived if sited along a designated pedestrian corridor. The City also provides incentives for large development programs, including parking cash out, shared parking, and park-and-ride.
- There are a many benefits of buffer zones on sidewalks and Seattle’s recognition of this through a tree-planting program is noteworthy. In addition to requiring street trees in all new development, the City also recently planted more than 800 trees in rights-of-way and also provided free trees to residents in a number of neighborhoods.
- Understanding that fostering good walking practices in children is essential, Seattle’s Safe Routes to School program sets a high standard. The Seattle School Traffic Safety Committee, composed of representatives from Seattle Public Schools, Seattle Police Department, and Seattle Department of Transportation, creates walking route maps for every public elementary school in Seattle. The DOT also works with Feet First, a local pedestrian advocacy group, to conduct walkability audits at several schools a year. Seattle schools perform regular counts of how children get to school and, in one case, found a 49 percent increase in walking to school after the completion of a SRTS infrastructure project.
- The Seattle Parks and Recreation department shows its commitment to walkers of all ages through a volunteer-supported walking program for adults age 50 and up called Sound Steps. Sound Steps is a free,community-based walking program designed to get older adults active and experiencing the benefits of regular exercise. It is a year-round program that provides connection to other walkers, tools to measure progress, a number of weekly walks from various locations, monthly hikes, and training for longer events.
- In 2008, Seattle piloted Car Free Days to open up streets to bicycling, walking, and playing. The City renamed it Celebrate Seattle Summer Streets in 2009 and made extensive efforts to involve local businesses, farmers markets, parades, art walks, and more. In 2011, there will be Summer Streets events on four different streets through the summer, as well as Bicycle Sundays almost every Sunday from May to September.
- The neighborhood traffic calming program in Seattle is impressive, particularly the neighborhood traffic circle element of the program. These mini-circles have been found to reduce motor vehicle crashes by an average of 90 percent in Seattle. Over the past 30 years, Seattle has installed over 1,000 traffic circles and has now instituted a formal process for proposal, as there is still enormous demand. There are criteria for proposal evaluation and detailed information about the process available through the City’s website, allowing access for neighborhoods to explore this option.
Again, much more info is available on the Seattle page.
Reprinted with permission from Ecolocalizer
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