Walkable Neighborhoods...We Really Do Have Them (house, traffic)

[KerryB]

Yeah, but aren't Riverside, Avondale & San Marco the only neighborhoods where you can walk AND actually find some things to walk to?? I mean, Riverside/5 Points is actually got some useful stuff in it (good selection of restaurants, a grocery, boutiques, coffee shops, gyms, specialty stores, etc).

Even if a neighborhood is technically walkable but still doesn't have much to walk to, then its kinda useless IMO. If there were public transportation it would be one thing, but there isn't.

[riveree]

Originally Posted by KerryB

Yeah, but aren't Riverside, Avondale & San Marco the only neighborhoods where you can walk AND actually find some things to walk to?? I mean, Riverside/5 Points is actually got some useful stuff in it (good selection of restaurants, a grocery, boutiques, coffee shops, gyms, specialty stores, etc).

Even if a neighborhood is technically walkable but still doesn't have much to walk to, then its kinda useless IMO. If there were public transportation it would be one thing, but there isn't.

I'd say, no, they aren't the only neighborhoods that have something to walk to.

Murray Hill has it's own park, library, billiard hall, a Winn Dixie, a theatre (christian rock or something...but still !), and it's a dense area, so all these things are clustered together closely enough to give it some walkability. I can't find a link to their preservation society, but here's a link about the neighborhood:

Murray Hill Preservation Association « The Hill

and a photo tour:

Metro Jacksonville - A Murray Hill Photo Tour

Lakewood also has a city park, a Winn Dixie, a Publix, an Asian market, a new gym, Starbucks, a bar, a Postal Annex, some great restaurants including Sekisui, Tijuana Flats, Leo's Italian, Cebiche Jax, and a bunch of other restaurants, a Planet Smoothie, Healthy Bagel where they make bagels, Stein Mart, Rosenblum's, you can fish or launch a canoe/kayak at Rose Creek - there really is a ton of stuff packed in on University Blvd/San Jose Blvd/Saint Augustine Rd and it's walkable with sidewalks and also public transportation right there. I can't find a photo tour...maybe I'll have to make one .

At the other end of University, San Souci has a couple of parks, a Winn Dixie, some little sandwich shops and probably a bunch of other places I'm not even aware of.

San Marco obviously has much cooler stuff to walk to, but one cannot live on boutiques alone, right? One thing San Marco still doesn't have is a grocery store.

But San Marco and Riverside are in the top 4 on the list for good reason, and I'm in complete agreement - they're great walkable neighborhoods - they're just not the be-all-end-all, and I think that's what the walkscore highlights.

[KerryB]

Originally Posted by riveree

San Marco obviously has much cooler stuff to walk to, but one cannot live on boutiques alone, right? One thing San Marco still doesn't have is a grocery store.

You're right. This is why I wouldn't ever consider living in San Marco. Most the stuff they have to walk to is cool but not very useful. Plus, a lot of their stuff closes early, isnt open on Sundays, etc. Dont get me wrong, its a very cool neighborhood, but the coolness would get old after a while IMO & you would need more sustenance.

Really the only place I've seen in town that you could truly go without a car most the time (besides commuting to work & some other stuff obviously) & not be limiting yourself too much is Riverside/5 Points.

[travelingfood]

Now I think about it, few developed CDD communities can be considered walkable neighborhoods.

[Sunnydee]

Two years ago I visited Jax in search of a safe, affordable community/neighborhood with single family, one story homes that would allow me to walk to a:
library
grocery
community swimming pool w/o CDD fees

The best the realtor and I could find was Eagle Harbor, but it had CDD fees. I left very disappointed because I loved your city and hoped it would be walkable.
Has Jacksonville changed so that there are now other choices?

[riveree]

Originally Posted by Sunnydee

Two years ago I visited Jax in search of a safe, affordable community/neighborhood with single family, one story homes that would allow me to walk to a:
library
grocery
community swimming pool w/o CDD fees

The best the realtor and I could find was Eagle Harbor, but it had CDD fees. I left very disappointed because I loved your city and hoped it would be walkable.
Has Jacksonville changed so that there are now other choices?

Eagle Harbor is not actually in Jacksonville (Duval county), but in neighboring Clay county. Clay is still sparsely populated, much of it is rural, so I don't think you'll find too much walkability there.

When I think of walkability, I think of older, first ring neighborhoods, and if you scroll back to the first page where I printed Jacksonville's most walkable neighborhoods according to Walkscore, you'll find at least 1/2 of the Top 20 are within roughly 5 miles of the core of downtown Jacksonville. So these neighborhoods are circa 1920, 1930, 1940, etc.

You can still find much of what you're looking for - safe, affordable, community, single family homes - in many of these Top 20 and you should be able to walk to some or maybe all of what you're looking for, no CDD fees either . But you'd be hard pressed to find a community swimming pool (or one you'd want to swim in anyway ) and you aren't likely to find a new construction home unless it's built on a teardown lot.

Maybe by the time you make your next visit we'll have a New Urbanist community where you can have all the things you want and it will be new construction, but so far, I'm not impressed with the attempts I've seen in NEFL (not that I've seen them all....maybe someone else knows of one). I think you'll still have CDD fees, it's going to be hard to avoid if you go with a planned community.

[kimana517]

I live in Cedar Hills, and my address gets a score of 51. I'm actually surprised it's that low, but then I realized they don't take into account doctor's offices, dentists, etc. (I walk to both of those.) I bet we would rank higher if those counted. But I can walk to the grocery store, drug store, gym, dollar store, several restaurants (varying in quality and fare), veterinarian, bank, the afore-mentioned doctors and dentists, thrift store (my bread and butter), movie rental store (and two Redboxes), 3 clothing stores, etc., all within a mile from here. Expand it to two miles and we've got everything on 103rd between 295 and Blanding (library, Walmart, another grocery store, another drugstore, tons more restaurants). And with the police station so nearby, we haven't had any crime problems in the 3 years we've lived here.

I pretty much love this area of Jax, and can't quite figure out why others look down upon it. I guess because they haven't lived here?

[riveree]

Originally Posted by kimana517

I live in Cedar Hills, and my address gets a score of 51. I'm actually surprised it's that low, but then I realized they don't take into account doctor's offices, dentists, etc. (I walk to both of those.) I bet we would rank higher if those counted. But I can walk to the grocery store, drug store, gym, dollar store, several restaurants (varying in quality and fare), veterinarian, bank, the afore-mentioned doctors and dentists, thrift store (my bread and butter), movie rental store (and two Redboxes), 3 clothing stores, etc., all within a mile from here. Expand it to two miles and we've got everything on 103rd between 295 and Blanding (library, Walmart, another grocery store, another drugstore, tons more restaurants). And with the police station so nearby, we haven't had any crime problems in the 3 years we've lived here.

I pretty much love this area of Jax, and can't quite figure out why others look down upon it. I guess because they haven't lived here?

I wonder why they don't count doctor's offices? Maybe because it's more of an occasional trip to make, not a daily event, so driving isn't as big of a deal/impact? If the doctor's trip is a daily event, you're probably not out walking around the neighborhood anyway .

[projectmaximus]

Originally Posted by riveree

I should have checked this first, here's their scoring requirements (they do count public transport):


We'll be the first to admit that Walk Score is just an approximation of walkability. There are a number of factors that contribute to walkability that are not part of our algorithm:

Public transit: Good public transit is important for walkable neighborhoods.

Street width and block length: Narrow streets slow down traffic. Short blocks provide more routes to the same destination and make it easier to take a direct route.

Street design: Sidewalks and safe crossings are essential to walkability. Appropriate automobile speeds, trees, and other features also help.

Safety from crime and crashes: How much crime is in the neighborhood? How many traffic accidents are there? Are streets well-lit?

Pedestrian-friendly community design: Are buildings close to the sidewalk with parking in back? Are destinations clustered together?

Topography: Hills can make walking difficult, especially if you're carrying groceries.

Freeways and bodies of water: Freeways can divide neighborhoods. Swimming is harder than walking.

Weather: In some places it's just too hot or cold to walk regularly.



So one of these factors may have worked against DC .

I didn't take the time to read the entire rest of this thread...just skimmed it...but I wanted to let you know that you misinterpreted what you posted from the site. "There are a number of factors that contribute to walkability that are not part of our algorithm:"

They above is a list of factors that were NOT part of their walkability equation. So public transportation is not considered, nor is weather, safety, traffic calming devices, etc. Pure and simple they use google maps to calculate the number of options you have for obtaining necessities in a specific radius around a given address...and they assume a half-mile walk to a small convenience store is the same as one to a 24-hour grocery store, even if an 8-lane interstate high-way runs in between.

So, needless to say, there are plenty of problems with blindly accepting their results, but with that in mind, it's still very useful.

[KerryB]

I agree. I think its a useful tool as far as the map feature goes & letting you know what's around a specific address that one could walk to, but those scores are SERIOUSLY flawed & should be taken with a huge grain of salt.

For instance, I put in Blanding Blvd here in town (Orange Park) around where Best Buy is & it gave me a 70%. They don't even have crosswalks or sidewalks there. So, I guess we're supposed to walk on the side of the highway & play chicken with cars to get across the street. WooHoo! "Very Walkable" indeed.