What’s your ‘Walk Score’?
One key metric in measuring a neighborhood’s triple bottom line is its walkability, and no site does that better than
Walk Score. Based on the number of retail businesses and amenities, you type in an address in its google-run system and it spits out a rating from 1 to 100 telling you just how walkable it is. Check out their rating system and benefits for scoring higher. One pretty darn handy feature is a left column list of the nearest common amenities, listed by distance.
As you can see based on the image, Affinity Lab, an oft-mentioned co-working place in Washington DC, rates a pretty respectable 91 out of 100. Of course, it can’t beat most destinations in New York City, which garner the full 100 rating. My previous address in San Francisco’s Upper Haight earned a 100 as well.
Thanks to the folks at Walk Score for mentioning us here in their What Makes a Walkable Neighborhood? section.
By the way, apparently the site was so popular that the Google-technology-based website was being put on hold on account of too much traffic… by Google. Now that’s saying something.
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Walk Score is a great idea! Unfortunately there’s no information available yet for Auckland, New Zealand! So we score a 0 out of 100- it kind of feels like that’s appropriate sometimes!
I believe that walk score is cool, but nowadays more and more people prefer to drive cars. Homes are often located in an area where some establishments are easier to get to by car than on foot. I’ve recently found a type of service on drivescore.fizber.com which is called Drive Score. It shows a map of what establishments are in your neighborhood and calculates a Drive Score based on the number of places within a convenient driving distance.
Thanks Vendi for the URL! I’ve used that drive score service and was surprised how useful it can be!