Walk Scores
I saw Walk Score mentioned on a blog a few weeks back -- it's one of the best Google Mashups I've seen yet. The idea is simple -- you enter an address and the site determines a walkability score from 0-100, based on proximity to stores, bars, restaurants, etc. the author is an advocate of a walking lifestyle (check out his page on walkable neighborhoods) and has positioned his gadget as a way to determine if a house you're interested in is in a walkable area.
One of the reasons we love Harrisburg so much is because of how walkable it is, so I was not at all surprised when our house rated an 82 (and it should be higher, since Riverfront Park shows up as 0.66 miles away when in reality it's less than a tenth of a mile away). What makes that even better is that our old house in the mountains of southern California rates a 3.
A few friends on The Well have posted their scores and I've seen a 100 (East Village NY) and a 2 (in the hills between San Jose & Santa Cruz). I plugged in a bunch of my old addresses, and I think the progression is interesting:
In the Shadow of Wrigley Field, Chicago: 93
The Historic Crack District, San Francisco: 100
The House by the Lake, Oakland: 83
Mountains of Southern California: 3
Current house, Hbg: 82
Which of these things is not like the others?
Walk Score is a fun site, and a perfect example of the great stuff you can do with Google's API. One of these days should figure out how to use it. See what your house's score is (and post it here if you do). Somewhere, Jane Jacobs is smiling.
Labels: hbg
posted by Christian @ 1:13 PM
5 Comments
5 Comments:
Wow, what a coincidence . . . we're an 82 as well. Of course I already knew that, what with all the trips I take to the Tap Room for drinks (they open at 7 a.m., so if I'm ever thirsty on my way to work, I just pop on in); and since I buy most of my clothes at the Jean Joint (where the sign reads "Shoes and Shirt required, Bras and Panties Optional")
All joking aside, though, our neighborhood is extremely walkable. The picture you posted just happens to be about 15 feet from my office, which I walk to. And if I lived here (which it sometimes feels like I do) the walkscore would be 94.
b
Yeah, the downside of it being an automated site is that it doesn't make any judgment about which bars/stores/restaurants it lists.
It calls us a 32, but really...I think that's low. How do you find out what it thinks we lack? I walk everywhere.
Take a look down the left side of the map and it'll show what the closest of each category is. So the closest drug store is the Osco, the closest movie theatre is the Tivoli, etc.
Plug in my address & you'll see how much closer everything is...
Right. When I enter the address of new condos just north of the tracks on Forest it's an 82.
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