There's been talk recently about a cool site that is a pretty interesting way to do local: Walk Score. According to their site,
What is Walk Score?
We help homebuyers, renters, and real estate agents find houses and
apartments in great neighborhoods. Walk Score shows you a map of what's
nearby and calculates a Walk Score for any property. Buying a house in
a walkable neighborhood is good for your health and good for the
environment.
So what makes a "walkable" neighborhood?
Basically, a walkable neighborhood has various characteristics within a reasonable range of where you live. There is generally a center with a main street, parks and public spaces, schools and workplaces nearby. And the more a neighborhood is designed around and for the pedestrian, obviously the more walkable it is.
Testing it Out
I decided to check out some of my previous addresses to see how "walkable" they were. Here's how their scoring works (for a full breakdown, see how it works):
- 90-100 = Walker's Paradise
- 70-90 = Very Walkable
- 50-70 = Some Walkable Locations
- 25-50 = Not Walkable
- 0-25 = Driving Only
They arrive at these scores by compiling the distance to walkable locations nearby and assigning a score to each of these. Then, they simply compile all of these scores into what becomes a location's "Walk Score."
My Childhood Home
Here is how my childhood home in the sticks stacks up: 51 out of 100
Not very walkable at all--I definitely grew up in the suburbs and the only places I really could walk to were work (at the neighborhood pool), the soccer field, and the gym.
My School Address
63 out of 100 ... "some walkable locations"
I'm slightly surprised by how low this walk score is, but many of the things and places that they judge are self-contained on the University campus. Therefore, I doubt that they included all the restaurants, parks, fields, etc at the university. However, there was definitely a nice little college town there and not too much of a need for a car.
My Current Address
100 out of 100 ain't too shabby!
I definitely agree with how "walkable" this neighborhood is. We live in the heart of Dupont Circle and there is everything I need within walking distance: two supermarkets, convenient stores, restaurants, bars, gyms, clothing stores, and even a hardware store.
In fact, I live with 7 people and I am the only one who has a car--- and my car is a 35 minute metro ride + 15 minute drive away, so it more or less serves as a lawn ornament at my parent's house (much to their delight...)
This is actually a really cool site, so try it out. I just tried to use it again though and it appears they have been having a lot of traffic, so you might need to try back tomorrow.
For more information, the Washington Post has a nice little write-up about it in today's paper, available online here.
The 56th edition of the Carnival of Real Estate was hosted by the new GeekEstateBlog. They did a great job highlighting both "geeky" and "non-geeky" posts this week. 
