Headlines: Philly Among the Top 10 Most Job-Accessible Cities By Walking

Photo credit: Paul Sableman via Flickr

Did you walk to work today? If you live in Philadelphia proper and answered “no,” all we can say is buddy, you best start taking advantage of living in what researchers at the University of Minnesota’s Accessibility Observatory are citing as the eighth most job-accessible city for pedestrians. Check out the full report here.

Determining a particular city’s ranking were its average accessibility (because although WalkScore has dubbed Philadelphia the fourth most walkable city overall, it’s not all about walking trails and sidewalks) and the amount of jobs reachable within a ten-minute timespan. Cities went down in their ranking weight with increased work travel times.

You’ll note, as Sustainable Cities Collective points out, that the top 10 cities on the list (New York, San Fran, L.A., Chicago, Washington D.C., Seattle, Boston, Philly, San Jose, and Denver, in case you were wondering) have a blend of two major elements that pave the way for their easy home-to-work walking commute:

The cities that make up the top 10 all have a combination of employment density and fast, frequent transit service. “Employment density is a primary factor in whether an area is economically walkable or not, and employment densities are typically high in cities that employ heavy rail systems leading into a central core,” [Accessibility Observatory director Andrew] Owen says. “In this way, transit systems promote walkability and walking accessibility, without requiring a user to board a transit vehicle to experience the positive effects.

Emphasis ours. Now here’s a visual for yah:

Given what Owen says about speedy and frequent transit service promoting work walkability, it’s not surprising to see good portions of Philadelphia under the green tint that labels them as not having many jobs around that are within walking distance.  Perhaps beefed up bus service (or a long anticipated idea) could change that one day.

• Access Across America: Walking 2014 [Accessibility Observatory]

H/T: Where can you walk to work? Study ranks cities for accessibility to jobs by walking [Sustainable Cities Collective]  

Meanwhile, Philly’s fight against blight…

Philly’s fight against blight seems to be making headway with help from the Philadelphia Horticultural Society. Bonus? There’s a little health benefit that comes with that:

“In one recent study, [University of Pennsylvania professor Charles C.] Branas and researchers led Philadelphia residents on walking tours around vacant lots before and after they’d been greened. The sight of blight actually boosted residents’ heart rates; the sight of the greenery eased it.”