Citation

Lewis S, Grande del Valle E. Cities 2019; 86: 11-24.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2019, Elsevier Publishing)

DOI

10.1016/j.cities.2018.12.017

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Suburbanization and auto dependency have major problems. An alternative, the walkable neighborhood system, is one of a number of ideas designed to increase walking and other non-auto modes (NAM), sustainability, economic productivity, physical health, and livability. NAM includes walk, bicycle, public transit, and public cars (taxi, ehail ride, car share, car rental). A walkable neighborhood system has a high population density and complementary features that support local business and transit within an attractive walking distance. For a case study, we look at San Francisco, a world class city with high densities comparable to European cities. This article for the first time delineates neighborhoods in terms of walkable areas and correlations with four indicators of sustainability. We delineated 85 walking-area neighborhoods using ArcMAP and analyzed their correlations with NAM, vehicle miles traveled, walk score, and food sources. The hypothesis of a very high correlation of density and NAM is confirmed: densities over 50 persons per neighborhood acre support NAM above 60%. An exponential decrease in auto dependency with density is confirmed, but with a low correlation. The transition is gradual and uneven among neighborhoods. The large variation of performance among neighborhoods with very similar densities needs more research into complementary features. The correlation of density with vehicle miles traveled is very high, −0.807. The correlation of density with Walk Score is moderate, due to Walk Score being concerned with walkability and not with the underlying land uses supporting sustainability. The correlation of density with food sources is very high and the highest of the correlations we found.

Language: en

Keywords

Food sources; Neighborhood density; Percent NAM; Vehicle miles per capita; Walkability; Walkable neighborhood systems