{"id":27713,"date":"2012-03-27T11:28:34","date_gmt":"2012-03-27T15:28:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spacingtoronto.ca\/?p=27713"},"modified":"2012-03-27T12:14:23","modified_gmt":"2012-03-27T16:14:23","slug":"the-walkable-city-a-new-report-from-toronto-public-health","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2012\/03\/27\/the-walkable-city-a-new-report-from-toronto-public-health\/","title":{"rendered":"“The Walkable City”: a new report from Toronto Public Health"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

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Yesterday, Toronto’s Medical Officer of Health released a new report by Toronto Public Health, The Walkable City: Neighbourhood Design and Preferences, Travel Choices and Health<\/em><\/a> (PDF). It will be discussed at the Board of Health meeting<\/a> next Monday, April 2 (deputations can be made).<\/p>\n

The report is fascinating, and I’ll be discussing it more in the next issue of Spacing<\/em>, but here are a few quick thoughts.<\/p>\n

The map above (p.8) shows Toronto’s walkability, with the lighter portions indicating greater walkablity (‘utilitarian walkability” being how easy it is to walk to do utilitarian things — get to work, shop — as opposed to for pure recreation). It’s striking how much high walkability follows the boundaries of the old City of Toronto. There are a couple of additional areas of high walkability in two of the areas designated by the official plan as “centres”, in North York and Etobicoke, which reinforces the finding of a recent study<\/a> that the “centres” concept is working to some extent.<\/p>\n

The report also confirms the findings of many studies: that people who live in highly walkable areas walk more and are less likely to be in danger of obesity than those in car-oriented areas. More interestingly, it helps to answer the debate about why that is the case: whether neighbourhood walkability encourages people to walk, or people who like walking just self-select into walkable locations.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The core of the report is a survey of residents of Toronto and the GTA to find out both their preferences regarding walkable vs. car-oriented neighbourhoods, and their personal walking habits.<\/p>\n

The study does find some self-selection. People in the City of Toronto (including Etobicoke, North York and Scarborough) are significantly more likely to prefer walkable neighbourhoods, rather than car-oriented ones, than people in the more suburban GTA. In Toronto, 74% strongly prefer walkable in principle, vs. only 6% preferring car-oriented, while in the GTA it’s 46%-21%. (People who didn’t have a strong preference are not included).<\/p>\n

When asked a series of questions about tradeoffs — accepting smaller houses and lots in exchange for walkability features — around half of Toronto residents still strongly preferred walkability, vs. 7-15% who went for more private space and more need for a car. The GTA numbers varied quite a lot depending on the question, but fluctuated around roughly even numbers.<\/p>\n

So, to some extent people who value walking move to more walkable areas, and people who value bigger houses\/lots and car-oriented communities go to suburban areas.<\/p>\n

However, even within Toronto the number of people who prefer walkable areas is much greater than the number of people who live in highly walkable areas (as visible in the map above, where highly walkable areas cover less than half the population of the city). The report finds “There is a strong latent demand among Toronto residents for more walkable features in their neighbourhoods.” So the self-selection is only partial — desire for walkability is stronger than the available supply.<\/p>\n

It should be noted, though (the report downplays this a bit) that a good 62% of people in Toronto *feel* they live in a highly walkable neighbourhood. So perception of walkability is a little more flexible than the statistical numbers used for the map. But when it comes to specifics, there are still areas where people feel a need for improvement. (The Walkability Studies<\/a> of tower neighbourhoods also found that, while people often feel their neighbourhoods are walkable, when it comes to specifics they can identify many ways in which they would like it to be improved).<\/p>\n

Also, the report finds that even people who are car-oriented will walk more if they live in a walkable neighbourhood — and people who are walking-oriented will walk less if they live in a car-oriented neighbourhood. So urban design does play a role in shaping people’s behaviours, whatever their preferences are.<\/p>\n

The overall message is that the vast majority of people across the City of Toronto strongly desire to live in a walkable neighbourhood, and the City of Toronto has some work do to to make that a reality.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Yesterday, Toronto’s Medical Officer of Health released a new report by Toronto Public Health, The Walkable City: Neighbourhood Design and Preferences, Travel Choices and Health (PDF). It will be discussed at the Board of Health meeting next Monday, April 2 (deputations can be made). The report is fascinating, and I’ll be discussing it more inContinue reading ““The Walkable City”: a new report from Toronto Public Health”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4006,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2,6],"tags":[5628,19567,19566,19570,19569,19568,91,5246,2643,416,36,89,19,7105,19571,496],"class_list":["post-27713","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","category-walking","tag-board-of-health","tag-car-oriented-areas","tag-car-oriented-communities","tag-car-oriented-neighbourhood","tag-car-oriented-neighbourhoods","tag-car-oriented-ones","tag-etobicoke","tag-health","tag-medical-officer","tag-pdf","tag-resources","tag-scarborough","tag-toronto","tag-walkable-city","tag-yesterday","tag-york"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n"The Walkable City": a new report from Toronto Public Health - Spacing Toronto<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2012\/03\/27\/the-walkable-city-a-new-report-from-toronto-public-health\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\""The Walkable City": a new report from Toronto Public Health - Spacing Toronto\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Yesterday, Toronto’s Medical Officer of Health released a new report by Toronto Public Health, The Walkable City: Neighbourhood Design and Preferences, Travel Choices and Health (PDF). 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