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Here's a calculation and ranking of cities in the US by the number (and percentage) of residents living in Neighborhoods with a 70+ Walkscore.
By percentage of overall population
1. NYC | 93.5%
2. San Francisco | 87.6%
3. Boston | 83.8%
4. Miami | 79.3%
5. Philadelphia | 76.8%
6. Chicago | 75.2%
7. Oakland | 66.9%
8. DC | 63.5%
9. Seattle | 54.3%
10. Long Beach | 50.2%
11. Minneapolis | 47.9%
12. Honolulu | 47.1%
13. Baltimore | 45.3%
14. Portland | 39%
15. New Orleans | 38.7%
16. Los Angeles | 37.9%
17. Milwaukee | 36.8%
18. St. Louis | 27.8%
19. Atlanta | 24.8%
20. Denver | 24.5%
21. St. Paul | 21.7%
22. San Diego | 19.5%
23. Cleveland | 10.3%
24. Columbus, OH | 9.4%
25. Kansas City | 8%
By total population
1. NYC | 7,633,744 people
2. Chicago | 2,019,249 people
3. Los Angeles | 1,411,353 people
4. Philadelphia | 1,168,854 people
5. San Francisco | 698,363 people
6. Boston | 515,418 people
7. DC | 373,063 people
8. Seattle | 329,249 people
9. Miami | 315,924 people
10. Baltimore | 275,444 people
11. Oakland | 267,802 people
12. San Diego | 253,343 people
13. Portland | 226,152 people
14. Long Beach | 219,359 people
15. Milwaukee | 216,137 people
16. Minneapolis | 182,526 people
17. Honolulu | 154,727 people
18. Denver | 148,704 people
19. New Orleans | 133,110 people
20. Houston | 97,404 people
21. Atlanta | 95,299 people
22. St. Louis | 89,529 people
23. Austin | 73,294 people
24. Columbus, OH | 68,386 people
25. St. Paul | 59,271 people
Cool! Obvious problem is using city limits but still interesting.
Well, yes but I wanted to just run the data for mainly the largest us cities. There are some that I did not run though. I think for cities like Jersey City and Newark, you'd definitely see them on the list too. But some smaller cities, if you ran them for this, would dominate. Evanston, IL for example would show up as 100%
It would be interesting to see which UA have the largest clusters of contiguous neighborhoods. I would imagine Boston would have some contiguous neighborhoods with Cambridge/Somerville and Brookline. DC might have it with Arlington. Maybe West Hollywood would flow into LA, etc.
OTOH, I would imagine that some of the cities might have isolated pockets of high walkscore neighborhoods that are somewhat isolated from other walkable neighborhoods. IMO, the most truly walkable neighborhoods are walkable neighborhoods that are located in a dense cluster of other walkable neighborhoods.
I'm not 100% sure, but most of them are very close to 2010's Census. There were some incomplete cities though like Dallas, Phoenix, Houston, etc. I forgot to note those in there for some reason.
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It would be interesting to see which UA have the largest clusters of contiguous neighborhoods. I would imagine Boston would have some contiguous neighborhoods with Cambridge/Somerville and Brookline. DC might have it with Arlington. Maybe West Hollywood would flow into LA, etc.
That would be interesting too. Just randomly running a few suburbs in major areas. Evanston, IL shows up as 100%. Cambridge, MA is 93.3%. Santa Monica is 88%.
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OTOH, I would imagine that some of the cities might have isolated pockets of high walkscore neighborhoods that are somewhat isolated from other walkable neighborhoods. IMO, the most truly walkable neighborhoods are walkable neighborhoods that are located in a dense cluster of other walkable neighborhoods.
Yeah - and I think with the most walkable cities, there is a huge continuous area of walkable neighborhoods, but I think what you say is also true. The walkscore site for each geography you look up has a map and you could spot potential areas like this.
Walkscore also has bikescore and transit score. It would also be interesting to look at - I started looking at bikescore and was surprised that so far out of 21 cities, NYC is barely in the top 10. I would have expected higher. The top 5 so far are San Francisco, Portland, Denver, Boston, and Chicago in that order.
The last topic was about average walk score not neighborhoods with walkscores over 70. However the net result wouldn't be too different. I don't see why people take issue to Miami's ranking, must be some insecurity.
Nothing against walkscore, but IMHO an on the ground assessment of their scores often leaves a lot to be desired, especially as it relates to scale, design, and even quality of amenities. It certainly doesn't tell the whole story, though. The implication, for example, that Miami is a pedestrian friendly city is downright laughable, especially considering that it also ranks as the #4 deadliest pedestrian city in the deadliest state for pedestrians: The Four Most Dangerous Cities for Pedestrians*|*Kyle McCarthy. It's also nowhere near the top for commuter carpools, transit use, bike use, etc. etc.
Now I realize that Miami benefits from small city boundaries and a lot of packed highrises. But to paint an overall picture of a truly walking-friendly community- above places like Chicago or DC- is just misleading. In fact, transit advocates in Miami have a problem with the score, as it makes their job more difficult to encourage better urban design when local leaders can rest on their laurels! Walkscore Loses Credibility by Placing Miami in Top 10 | Transit Miami
The last topic was about average walk score not neighborhoods with walkscores over 70. However the net result wouldn't be too different. I don't see why people take issue to Miami's ranking, must be some insecurity.
Well, Miami is walkable. I think though the "offense" would be taken when you're comparing a city of 400,000 to one of 1.5 million or something. I think jpdivola brought up an excellent point to see which cities have their walkability continue into some suburbs. Hialeah would rank as 67% on here for example. Miami Beach is 60.2%. Coral Gables is 35.7%. North Miami is 0%.
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