December 4, 2007
Eat it, Portland! San Francisco Most "Walkable" City
Ocean Beach. Now, with less oil. Footprints photo courtesy of Jen Maiser. See the entire mise-en-scene here
You urban professionals, you certainly like your city hiking. Comes this morning the Washington D.C.-based Brookings Institute, which scoured thirty big U.S. cities looking for "walkable urban places." Brookings didn't consider a few factors that groups like Walk SF would care about. Like pedestrian safety, for example. Regardless, San Francisco ranks #3 in the U.S. and #1 on the west coast for "walkability". Just ahead of Portland, Oregon
Everybody get Footloose and Fancy Free: A Field Survey of Walkable Urban Places in the Top 30 U.S. Metropolitan Areas here in .pdf.
But why are we talking about Portland? And what about the claim we are the most walkable city in the entire U.S.? See you after the jump.
Here's what you do. You take a look another recent walking study here (or maybe here is better), then combine the rankings with the new Brookings study. Simply divide by two and San Francisco comes out on top. Bingo bango.
And Portland? Talk to enough people in San Francisco city government and others in local NGOs and you'll hear about how we compare with Stumptown on this or that issue. America's Greenest City, that kind of thing. It's a friendly rivalry. Everybody loves Portland, Ore., of course.
And, just for fun, check out the typos from the East Coasties at Brookings when they listed Regional Walkable Urban Places:
"Downtown Adjacent: South of Market; Marina District; Hob Hill, Mission District"
"Suburban Town Center: Palo Alto; Menlo Park; San Mateo, Emoryville, Walnut Creek"
Oh well. See you out there at those "walkable urban places"!
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Of course San Francisco is walkable. It's not like Muni is a viable transportation option. So we walk.
Of course San Francisco is walkable. It's not like Muni is a viable transportation option. So we walk.
And it's so much fun to run, too! As in the kind of running the Hash House Harriers do!
How can you take a study seriously when it lists one of our great walking spaces as "Hob Hill"? Not once but twice. Maybe they just left the "O" off the end.
How can you take a study seriously when it lists one of our great walking spaces as "Hob Hill"? Not once but twice. Maybe they just left the "O" off the end.
Maybe it was an elderly author with lousy eyesight ... I'll let Hob Hill pass.
I do like Portland's Powell Books, but agree San Francisco is much more enjoyable to walk around ... whether it be The Embarcadero, North Beach, Fillmore/Union Streets, or Castro/Mission.
Funny, I was just having this conversation with some friends last week and the consensus among those who've lived both places was that Portland is a far better walking city. Sure there's more to look at in San Francisco but it's hard to enjoy the view when you have BMW drivers and MUNI buses trying to mow you down every few minutes. I can't even count the number of times I've been scowled at or called an asshole for impeding some driver's red light running or right turn on red with crowds in the crosswalk. The aggressive driving culture of the Bay Area is a major strike against walking here. But of course, I'll keep doing it anyway.