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Check out this site: walkscore.com (thank you pampered mom!) My old neighborhood ranked an 80, my new one a 63 (though I KNEW that, it was worth the trade for the big backyard). The place where I grew up? a 20! (maybe that’s why this issue is so near and dear to my heart.) And the closest city to my hometown, the one that we used to drive to, to go shopping? It’s Jacksonville, Florida and it’s ranked 40 or 40. Yeesh!
Can’t wait to hear your scores!
xox,
heather
We’re a 6 but we chose the location of our house so that we would be just a five minute walk from hiking trails through a massive reserve. Sadly there is probably no address in town that would rate higher than a 15 or so.
My address got a 72, in the Bay Area too. I’m not surprised. That’s one of the reason we bought this house, because of the location close to the downtown area.
0. And it acctually said we could walk to places based on distances of as the crow flys. Like the library being less than 2 miles. Um, it takes 9 minutes by car and I’m not about to go crawling over barbed wire into other people’s cow fields.
Of course yesterday I did send the boys 5 and 6 years walking down to the neighbors by themselves (1/2 mile down the street) w/o any worries.
My current home is a 71, but it’s way more than that because it’s all flat and has nice, wide, recently repaved sidewalks in the shade. I’m in Portsmouth.
The suburb where I grew up is a 5 only because there are two seasonal orchards you can walk to (so if you can survive on apples and cider in the fall…) and two lumber yards. That place was unlivable without a car.
My parents’ first place where I was born is interesting; they say it’s a zero but they don’t include the neighbor up the street who sold them pre-market meat and vegetables, or the daycare down the road where we went.
my neighbourhood got a 92
my parents’ neighbourhood, where i lived in my late teens, got a 71 – but i think it’s bogus. i mean the “coffee shop” is dunkin donuts, and the “restaurant” is burger king! some of the supposedly walkable streets don’t have sidewalks. our best bet was to get on the bus and go to the mall
My address scores a 98!
Yay for downtown Ithaca, NY!
Unless it’s too cold to take kids outside we walk for the majority of our errands. My husband walks/bikes/rides the bus to work. My three boys (5 yo, 3 yo, 7 months) and I walk with the stroller just about everywhere – library, grocery stores, farmer’s market, children’s resale shop, parks, friends, church, restaurants. Our one car sits at home unless we need to make a longer trip.
62…. but i’d say it’s less than that, because a lot of the places listed are either already shut down, or getting ready to.
We moved across town in Logan, UT and our walkable score went down from 82 to 45.
It’s what I sacrificed to live on a less busy street.
The nearest park listed is a mile away, but there are actually two play areas in our planned unit development, much closer.
Where we live now, Belfast, Maine in the midcoast, a progressive small town that still has a downtown, hurray!, got an 80, and our old neighborhood/permanent location, Evanston, IL, a cool suburb of a big city, got an 82. The thing about that calculator is it does not discern quality, so our old neighborhood got high points for a gross convenience store where we *could* buy groceries (if you call Mountain Dew and Pop Tarts groceries–I don’t), but our new neighborhood has a fantastic natural foods co-op within walking distance. So I think that should be weighed much more heavily.
Mine got a 60.
I got an 82, however, it didn’t factor in weather and snow removal, so 5 months of the year, its really hard to walk – especially with small children and icy sidewalks.
our address rated a 54. Really, tho, it’s much higher for us in that my dh works exactly one mile from home, so he bikes to and from work most days. Shame there was no way to factor in for work location.
Our score is PITIFUL: a 6!!! We are planning to move soon-ish though and moving to a pedestrian-friendly area is at the top of our “list.”
Great topic, we were just talking about walking more after our weekend trip to Chicago, where we walked everywhere. Our address is a 58. Way better than I expected, and proves I can walk much more than I do.
Thank you!
[...] it is to walk everywhere. To get what you need by walking and not having to drive. Then I read on Mama Is today about the Walk [...]