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And to add one more point to my prior post, I think it is a bit tricky to just compare walkscores for entire cities b/c some cities have larger boundaries. So Jacksonville gets a terrible walkscore, but its downtown and certain neighborhoods may be more walkable than the downtowns of some of the cities with higher overall scores (like OKC for example).
Location: northern Vermont - previously NM, WA, & MA
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I would have thought Portland, OR would be ranked much higher. Certainly more walkable than Miami by a long shot.
Quote:
Originally Posted by kidphilly
And I also think this depends on an individuals tolerance and specific location.
To me
Boston
Chicago
DC
NYC
Philly
SF
all stand out as being the easiest.
Other cities like Atlanta/LA/Seattle (and many more like Pittsburgh and Baltimore) can offer this maybe on a more isolated basis but just about any place can offer it. People can live in Dallas without a car if locations for residence/PT/work are strategically set etc.
I would rank Seattle well above Atlanta and LA. Seattle is very walkable, I lived there without a car for a little while. It was easy. Many of the neighborhoods ther ehave grocery stores people can easily walk to. Downtown, Belltown, Capital Hill, and Queen Anne are all very cohesive.
Are there any lists for cities where you can go car free without any major problems?
I lived in Seattle for 5 years and never had a car . It was easy Seattle has 24hr bus service and rail runs 5am to 1am daily. Seattle is a very dense city .
I would have thought Portland, OR would be ranked much higher. Certainly more walkable than Miami by a long shot.
I would rank Seattle well above Atlanta and LA. Seattle is very walkable, I lived there without a car for a little while. It was easy. Many of the neighborhoods ther ehave grocery stores people can easily walk to. Downtown, Belltown, Capital Hill, and Queen Anne are all very cohesive.
In places yes but not over as large an area. Atlanta has many areas that one can live without a car as well. Overall though I do not put either in the same actegory with the other 6. Seattle probably has more walkable areas than does Atlanta but to me Atlanta and Seattle are closer to each other than would Seattle be to a Boston/Chicago/Philadelphia
Unfortunately, I have to question the accuracy of Walk Score. I know it's a complex thing to rate walkability, and I suppose considering that the web site does a pretty good job. But for my current location, it's way off. My address gets a 62 rating, which is mediocre, but when I consider actually trying to walk anywhere from my house, I would rank it less than 20. The nearest real grocery store is, according to the site, 1.5 miles away. But it counts the gas station down the street as a grocery store. Which is fine if your groceries consists solely of junk food. And besides the obvious problems with that, to walk to this gas station one must walk along a very busy street with no shoulder and no sidewalk. For restaurants, the first one it lists is McDonalds, and it puts it at .31 miles away. That's odd because it's more like .75 miles away. And walking there would be an absolute nightmare. Stranger still, there are many other restaurants that actually are fairly close to my house, all of which are more appealing than McDonalds. But again, actually safely walking to them is a different story, since to get to a street with sidewalks I would have to either walk along that busy street with none, or go far out of my way through neighborhoods. Regardless, the simple fact that there are no real grocery stores within a mile of my location makes it utterly unwalkable for me. Bikeable, fairly, but not walkable.
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