Walkable Urbanism - Page 7 - PhillyBlog

dlsh · #61 (**permalink**) 02-20-2008, 02:49 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by daveydoo

Nuclear plants.

Also some areas that can do geothermal, iceland i believe, wants to eventually generate hydrogen for use in cars.

I'm surprised no one has mentioned natural gas. The tech for that is available today and buses run on that already. It would be great to see the taxies change over to that. The downside is that natural gas is expensive due to its use for electricity generation as well as congress preventing new US production in the rockies and offshore.

Also, there was an artical about Fedex adding mini-electric trucks for door delivery in cities. That makes sense since they always go back to the same place at night for a recharge.

Problem of course with batteries is what to do with them when you are done with them. Same for the fluorescent bulbs - they have mercury in them.

omnivore · #62 (**permalink**) 02-20-2008, 04:25 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by dlsh

I'm surprised no one has mentioned natural gas.

That's because natural gas is still very much a fossil fuel. It's cleaner and more readily available in the US than gasoline, but it's still very much a fossil fuel, and therefore a contributor to global warming.

Quote:

Originally Posted by dlsh

Same for the fluorescent bulbs - they have mercury in them.

This argument is a bit of red herring. They have trace amounts of mercury, and it's less mercury than would be released into the atmosphere by burning the amount of coal it would take to generate the extra electricity necessary to power an incandescent bulb of similar wattage. So compact fluorescents are definitely the way to go.

niel · #63 (**permalink**) 02-20-2008, 04:35 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by thunda

You might be able to get to the places, but it would probably be much harder to get around once there. Like others have said, Europeans drive a lot, too. It's just that they don't necessarily design their communities around highways and negate any transportation other than cars.

No, it's fine getting around locally once you've reached your destination. I've done it many times in many parts of Europe. And it's doable for exactly the reason you cite - because more than one way to get around is built into the infrastructure of the place.

MarketStEl · #64 (**permalink**) 02-20-2008, 04:36 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by omnivore

This argument is a bit of red herring. They have trace amounts of mercury, and it's less mercury than would be released into the atmosphere by burning the amount of coal it would take to generate the extra electricity necessary to power an incandescent bulb of similar wattage. So compact fluorescents are definitely the way to go.

Pardon me for getting technical-nit-picky here, but what you meant to say in place of the boldfaced phrase above was "an incandescent bulb of similar light output."

Compact fluorescents are being promoted because they use less wattage to produce the same amount of light as a comparable incandescent bulb.

omnivore · #65 (**permalink**) 02-20-2008, 05:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MarketStEl

Pardon me for getting technical-nit-picky here, but what you meant to say in place of the boldfaced phrase above was "an incandescent bulb of similar light output."

D'oh. You're right. Thanks for catching it.

Hospitalitygirl · #66 (**permalink**) 02-20-2008, 06:37 PM

http://www.philly.com/philly/opinion...ER_CITIES.html

Quote:

PHILLY'S MANY WALKABLE 'CENTER CITIES'

By CHRISTOPHER B. LEINBERGER
WALK SCORE, a new Web site popular with urbanists and environmentalists (walkscore.com), rates places for their walkability - the ease of meeting daily needs on foot. The popularity of the site is an indicator that how the American Dream plays out on the ground has been fundamentally changing over the last 10 to 15 years.
The Ozzie and Harriet drivable suburban version of the American Dream is being supplemented by the Seinfeld vision of "walkable urbanism." Led by late-marrying young adults and empty-nester baby-boomers, many households are looking for the excitement and options living and working in a walkable urban place can bring. With almost nine of 10 new households over the next 20 years being singles or couples without children, this trend promises to continue.
A recent Brookings Institution survey of the largest 30 metro areas in the country identifies the 157 walkable urban places that play a regionally significant role. It also ranks the Top 30 metros in per capita number of walkable urban places. The Philadelphia metropolitan area ranks as the 13th highest on the number of walkable urban places per capita.
Certainly the many already revived downtowns like those in Denver, Washington, Portland, Seattle and San Diego are the most visible signs of the walkable urban trend. But there are many other places you might not suspect.
This includes the emergence of "downtown-adjacent" places like Chelsea and Union Square in New York, suburban town centers like Pasadena and Long Beach in the L.A. area and even built-from-scratch spots like Reston Town Center near Dulles Airport, 30 miles outside Washington.
A major benefit of walkable urban development is that it keeps and attracts young adults to the metro area, many of whom willingly trade crushing car commutes and high gas prices for lively walkable places to live and work.
Walkable urban places seem to attract the well-educated, the so-called "creative class."
Approximately 26 percent of Americans over 25 have college degree - but 99 percent of the new residents moving to Center City this decade have a college degree.
Walkable urbanism increases the economic development potential of the metro area in the knowledge economy. If many of the Gen X-ers and the Millennial generations do not get this lifestyle, they'll move to New York or Washington, depriving Philadelphia of the entrepreneurs it needs to grow.
Walkable urbanism is also essential to create sustainable places to live and work, reducing greenhouse-gas emissions. It is probable that walkable urban households emit less than half the greenhouse gas as driving suburban households - they walk more and unavoidably share heat with upstairs neighbors.
Center City and Society Hill are the most obvious, though not the only, locations of this trend in the Philadelphia region. The recent emergence of University City around Penn and Drexel, Manayunk and New Hope are other significant walkable urban places in the Delaware Valley.

MISSING ARE additional places in the suburbs, particularly around commuter and subway stations.
Rail transit is crucial for walkable urbanism places to emerge.
The investment has already been made for this comprehensive, if underfunded, rail system. Building high-density, mixed-use places around these stations will fulfill pent-up market demand, promote economic growth, lower greenhouse emissions and even give their suburban neighbors a great place for a restaurant within walking distance.
Over the next few years, Philadelphia metro will no doubt see its ranking in the Brookings survey rise while more households will see their Walk Score numbers soar. Seinfeld is coming to Philadelphia. *
Leinberger is a visiting fellow at the Brookings Institution, professor at the University of Michigan and a limited partner in Arcadia Land Co., which has projects in the Philadelphia and Kansas City areas. His most recent book is "The Option of Urbanism: Investing in a new American dream" (Island Press, 2007)

tbdiscovery · #67 (**permalink**) 02-20-2008, 07:05 PM

HG: thank you for posting this.

The numbers seem quite high - 9 out of 10 new households single or without children over the next 20 years? And 99% moving to CC have a college degree? Wow.

Brookings is top notch, but I'd like to see the basis behind the numbers. It sounds like conjecture.

romano · #68 (**permalink**) 02-21-2008, 01:18 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tbdiscovery

HG: thank you for posting this.

The numbers seem quite high - 9 out of 10 new households single or without children over the next 20 years? And 99% moving to CC have a college degree? Wow.

Brookings is top notch, but I'd like to see the basis behind the numbers. It sounds like conjecture.

99% sounds extreme, but how many people without college degrees can afford to move to Center City, really? I could barely afford to buy in Fishtown, and have a relatively nice job.

The number that jumped out at me was the Philly was only 13th most walkable city in the US. How is that possible? The only explanation I could think of was the lack of a well developed subway system. This way cities like Chicago, Boston and DC jump ahead of us, but still, 13th?

thunda · #69 (**permalink**) 02-21-2008, 01:41 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by romano

The only explanation I could think of was the lack of a well developed subway system. This way cities like Chicago, Boston and DC jump ahead of us, but still, 13th?

I think the relatively small subway system here could be blamed, but I don't really get why people think Boston's system is so much bigger:

Philadelphia:
MFL: 20.5 km, 22 stations
PATCO: 23 km, 13 stations
BSL: 19km, 25 stations (counting the Ridge Ave Spur)

Boston:
Red: 33km, 22 stations
Orange:18km, 19 stations
Blue:9km, 12 stations

The Green Lines in the two cities are harder to compare, but I do think that Boston's is probably of more utility for that city than the trolleys are for us.

omnivore · #70 (**permalink**) 02-21-2008, 01:59 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by romano

The number that jumped out at me was the Philly was only 13th most walkable city in the US. How is that possible? The only explanation I could think of was the lack of a well developed subway system. This way cities like Chicago, Boston and DC jump ahead of us, but still, 13th?

If you go back downthread, you'll see that I posted a link to an interview with Leinberger on Radio Times. In that interview, he fleshes his arguments out quite a bit more. To recap: he's not saying that Philly is the 13th most walkable city in the country, he's saying that it's 13th in the number of "walkable urban centers" in the entire metro area. Note that he cites New Hope ... in the interview, he also talks quite a bit about West Chester.

His definition of "walkable urban center" is also different than what we would instinctively think. Mostly, it's much smaller. He argues that for most people will walk about a mile for most things, so a "center" is actually quite a small area. That's why he counts Center City, Society Hill, and University City as separate "walkable urban centers," even though most of us actually living here would cross those boundaries all the time. By his definition, Manhattan alone has like 10 "walkable urban centers."

And "walkable urban centers" aren't necessarily linked by train transit. A lot of them are auto-only, for example his favorite greenfield "walkable urban center" development: Reston, VA. Same goes for West Chester and New Hope in the Philly area.

So that explains why he considers the Philly metro #13 ... because he's not actually talking about the walkability of the city. We all know that Philly is one the most walkable cities in the country, but he's talking about something slightly different.

Now, the interesting debate, I think, is whether or not his metric of measuring "walkable urban centers" actually tells us anything. As in, should we even care?