Redefining Walkability

Redefining Walkability
Examining equity and creating safer streets for all in DC
April 28, 2022


When the District of Columbia launched its Vision Zero initiative in 2015, a pedestrian or cyclist had been dying on the city’s streets every 21 days. Now, seven years into an initiative intended to eliminate traffic-related deaths by 2024, the District has gone backward: in 2021, a pedestrian or cyclist died in the nation’s capital every 18 days.

For the pedestrians and cyclists who navigate American cities, safe streets not only entail usable sidewalks and bike lanes, they also entail everything that makes someone willing to walk or bike through a neighborhood, such as a comfortable environment and freedom from fear of arrest, among other goals.

In decades past, transportation planners and policymakers in cities across the country demolished Black neighborhoods to add highways and invested in public transit systems that provided unequal access to communities of color. As a result, walkability across the US is highly racialized, with communities of color living in less-walkable neighborhoods that have fewer street lights, higher speed limits, and more police stops per capita.

Based on new research, we seek to expand the definition of walkability beyond the quality of infrastructure to emphasize equity and to inform policymakers who are working to meet Vision Zero goals. We have developed several indexes to reflect many of the issues that affect walkability in neighborhoods across Washington, DC. ................(more)

https://www.urban.org/features/redefining-walkability