(Via Slashdot) Science News Online has an article entitled Weighing In on City Planning. The article discusses research into the question of whether urban sprawl contributes to obesity in a city’s residents.
[Lawrence Frank] and other researchers have evidence that associates health problems with urban sprawl, a loose term for humanmade landscapes characterized by a low density of buildings, dependence on automobiles, and a separation of residential and commercial areas. Frank proposes that sprawl discourages physical activity, but some researchers suggest that people who don’t care to exercise choose suburban life. Besides working to settle that disagreement, researchers are looking at facets of urban design that may shortchange health.
As scientists investigate the relationship between sprawl and obesity, a compact style of city development sometimes called smart growth might become a tool in the fight for the nation’s health. However, University of Toronto economist Matthew Turner charges that “a lot of people out there don’t like urban sprawl, and those people are trying to hijack the obesity epidemic to further the smart-growth agenda [and] change how cities look.”
There is an association between the amount of time people spend in cars and how much they weigh and a similar association between the amount of time people walk (and the “walkability” of their cities) and how much they weigh. Apparently a typical white male living in a compact, mixed-use community weighs about 10 pounds less than a smilar man living in a diffuse subdivision containing nothing by homes. There might be a chicken & egg problem here, however. It may be that people with health habits and other propensities toward weight gain might choose neighborhoods where driving is the easiest way to get around. Other researchers challenge that hypothesis for a variety of reasons.
Locally, I suppose, this might put Gov. Daniels fitness agenda at odds with his road-building agenda. Though, to be fair, to date, his toll road proposals probably have more inter-city impact than intra-city impact.
Interesting. Sometimes entire cities are not particularly pedestrian/bicycle friendly. Richmond comes to mind, for instance. :) There are very few neighborhood stores anymore, and it can be unsafe to walk in some neighborhoods where sidewalks do exist. Then again, I see people in the new subdivisions–most of which do not have sidewalks and do require driving to get anywhere–taking the time to walk around their relatively safe, clean neighborhoods.
Also, I seem to recall hearing that the promenade in downtown Richmond was re-opened to vehicular travel.
For those who don’t know, a couple of blocks in downtown Richmond blew up in ’68 or ’69 due to some sort of combination of gas leak and significant amounts of gun powder in a sporting goods store. The rebuilt area was closed to motor vehicles. However, sometime in the past 10 years that changed and it was opened to cars.
I think I got that right.
I’m on a Bike / Ped planning group for the mayor’s office in Columbus. We’ve talked about some of these things at length, and one of the “chicken and egg” problems we have talked about is if this is sprawl is by choice.
For example, the “poor” neighborhoods have schools within walking distance, while the “rich” areas require bus or car to get to school.
The debate in our group is if it is worth making trails to schools. On one hand, kids won’t walk or bike if they have no safe path to school. On the other hand, there is a real good chance that if the parents didn’t mind buying a house in an area far from a school, they won’t encourage their kids to walk or bike to school even if there was a trail.
If that is the case, we’ll focus our resources on recreation paths and commuting lanes for adults.
One thing we are working on regardless is some way of enforcing sidewalk construction when new things are built, such as subdivisions as Pila pointed out.
We are also considering enforcing bike racks to be built on lots over XX size, and have room for more bikes based on lot size. Somewhat like handicap parking regulations.
End the end, we are hoping for “If you build it, they will get off their rear”. Based on how popular our people trail system has become, I think we’re on the right track.
As to your point about Daniels, I don’t see a conflict there. As you said, it is mostly from one city to another. The thing he has done that will be a huge positive is the state support for trails, and the idea of a trail within 15 miles of everyone in the state. I think you reported on this over the summer as well.
Doug, I have some vague memories of that explosion in downtown Richmond. My parents always liked going to the Richmond Square Mall, or the Salem Mall in Dayton (now defunct), I think it happened in April, 1968. I would have been 10 at that time, but remember my grandparents talking about it. If I remember correctly, there is an Elder-Beerman store there now. I could be mixed up on the Elder-Beerman store, my buddy from high school and his wife live in Lewisburg, O. (about 15 miles from Richmond), and frequently go to Richmond to eat, etc. would know if there is an Elder-Beerman store there.
Anyone who has driven extensively, as I have, knows that NW Indiana has countless railroads,some functioning,some little more than weed-grown tracks.A visionary govt could turn these already laid track beds into walking and biking trails, or upgrade them again for commuter railroads connecting Merrilville, Valparaiso,Crown Point,Schererville,and other growing urbanized areas, to each other to Chicago,and to the rest of the state. They are all attractive places to live. Give them improved ways of getting about,including walking,biking and commuting with intercity travel in the area also.Hoosiers are probably more familiar with Indianapolis as an Urban Center and see commuting as driving on expressways.I think NW INdiana has tremendous uptapped potential .Building an expressway from somewhere near Portage into Ilinois connecting north of Kankakee might be a good thing to help through-tavelers,but would locals be served as much as they would be by improved rail service?
As described in this blog, Indiana’s trail system could already be a prototype for the rest of the country.Now let’s add railroads.Indiana already has people who know how to do it.
One more important issue that is another topic. I flew into Gary Airport before Hooter airlines cancelled all its flights…40 minutes to the LOOP! Tie it all together!
Here are a couple observations on Gary Airport. It’s near major highways and has a stop on the South Shore railroad,but you have to ‘flag the train down’ which may put some people off. Also I flew from Lehigh Valley to Gary and only 3 other persons got off. The flight was continuing to Las Vegas and left filled up, but was less than half full from Allentown to Gary. There had been ‘steel ties’ between Lehigh Valley and Gary,but not much is left of american steel production,so maybe he ties are dead..
A couple from South Bend said they had driven to airport to pick someone up and found it very convenient with wide open driving.I dont think the airport has any passenger service now at all.It has just one room in center with boarding and waiting rooms together with a snack bar near entrance.There’s free parking and you park almost at door of waiting room.I can’t believe this airport can’t operate at a profit and benefit people in the area.
Even though the proposed outer loop toll road would mostly cater to through travelers, clearly Mitch’s agenda is further suburban growth. I though his “we can’t all live in Fishers” comment was among the most depressing thing that I have heard in a while. I have nothing against Fishers, and I think that Hamilton County, particularly the city of Carmel, is doing a far better job than any other suburban county of doing the things we say suburbs should do–bike trails, appearance standards for stores and businesses, etc. Still, it’s unfortunate that for some people it is absolutely unthinkable that we might someday restrain our growth and redevelop older parts of the metro area rather than the middle and upper classes abandoning successive concentric rings. Of course, the governor points out that it’s his job to benefit the people of Indiana, not just Indianapolis, but a large, blighted city certainly doesn’t aid anyone other than home builders and road builders. Our traffic in metro Indy is not bad compared to other cities, and the people who live in places like Shelbyville and Martinsville don’t seem to want the road.
So, I guess that is a long way of saying that the outer loop does have something to do with fitness and walkable communities in that it accepts sprawl as inevitable. There is plenty of undeveloped (or potentially redevelopable) land that is located close to existing highways. Why not make efficient use of the infrastructure we now have?
Unioncitynative and Doug:The explosion did occur in April, 1968. I was not quite four at the time, but my parents and older siblings remember it. In fact, my father was working downtown that day, and my mother was called in to work after the explosion. I don’t have any memory of it at all.
The Promenade was removed about 10 years ago and replaced with a winding, narrow version of US 40that does not much resemble the way things were before the explosion. There are still sidewalks downtown, however, and it is one of the areas of town that is fairly hospitable to pedestrians.
Jason: There was a move afoot here to require new subdivisions to have sidewalks and street lights, but I don’t know what came of it. Funny thing is, the subdivisions typically don’t have a lot of traffic, so it is not particularly dangerous to walk around, despite the lack of sidewalks. Plus, the people who can afford to live in them tend to be older, well-heeled, and have the time and ability to walk for their health or just for fun.
Lou: we have the Cardinal Greenway here. It runs along the railroad line that went to Chicago, IIRC. The trail is nice, except, at least in the parts I have walked, there are no benches for taking a rest. Thus, the walking group I started–which is made up of mostly women my mother’s age and older–cannot use the trail.
One of the sad things about “Rails to trails” plans is that the local landowners often try to block the redevelopment. Some make the point that they had to give up that land for rails, but trails are a different use and don’t get to use their land.
The other barrier that often comes up is that 90% if the rail line is still available, but there are sections that have been redeveloped along the way. So you might have 100 miles on a line, but there are 15 1/2 mile chunks taken out by a house, factory, etc…
I LOVE the idea of a suburban rail line, but again, I think people want their independance. For example, I would have taken the rail to Indy and back to Columbus when I had to commute, but my job has variable hours. There was a car pool that ran from Columbus at one time, but I can’t drop my keyboard right at 5:00 every night if I plan on keeping my job. If I miss my ride, it is a long walk back home.
If we would get to a point where everyone had a 9-5 job again, that would be great. Too many people need to work much later, and when you’re already at work 3 hours late you really don’t want to wait another 40 minutes for your bus / train.
I’ve been in on rail-to-trail talk in Westfield, and the fears Jason sites are the same there.
The real trick for a parks department or other agency is to be pro-active in conversation with the railroad if it looks like they may abandon a corridor. Understand that the railroad considers the corridor a liability in terms of taxes, land management, and physical harm liability if the property isn’t producing. this makes the RR eager to abandon however it can. When it simply abandons, the adjacent property owners have legitimate claims to 50% of the adjacent corridor. That is, unless the railroad has had conversations about ceding the whole corridor at once to a receiver.
As a right-of-way agent, I can testify to how very difficult it is to obtain a corridor from scratch. It’s also difficult to obtain pieces, so it really is the best thing to make it as easy as possible for the railroad to hand the whole thing off.
Now, if cities really want to stop sprawl, they might consider halting the policies that give people incentive to leave. Just a thought.
Such as? I don’t doubt what you are saying, but I also don’t know what policies you’re talking about.