Tag: Jennifer S. Mindell

Ann Forsyth, “What Is a Walkable Place? The Walkability Debate in Urban Design”

In “What Is a Walkable Place? The Walkability Debate in Urban Design,” Ann Forsyth contends that the term “walkability” is vague, because it is used “to refer to several quite different kinds of phenomena” (274). “Some discussions of walkability focus on the means or conditions by which walking is enabled, including areas being traversable, compact, physically enticing, or safe,” she writes. “Others propose that walkability is about the outcomes or performance of such walkable environments, such as making places lively and sociable, enhancing transportation options, or inducing exercise” (274). The term can also be used “as a proxy for better urban places—with some paying attention to walkability being multidimensional and measurable and others proposing that enhancing walkability provides a holistic solution to a variety of urban problems” (274). 

Forsyth’s literature review discusses why this confusion is a problem—she suggests that some of the outcomes of walkability are in conflict—and suggests nine different themes that appear in the various definitions of the term. It then proposes “two approaches to defining walkability that nest into a larger conceptualization of the term”:

First is a minimal definition based on having basic conditions for walking (traversability), combined with closeness and minimal safety. Second, the term walkability can be more clearly specified in terms of purpose. In doing this, scholars and practitioners would also more clearly distinguish between walkability features or means, walkability outcomes, and walkability as a proxy for improved, or at least measurable, place-making. (274-75)

Forsyth also argues that factors other than the physical components of a place need to be considered in discussions of walkability (275). Those factors could include the “pricing of relevant alternatives,” such as automobiles; policies and programs supporting walking; and the preferences, motivations, and demographics of the relevant population (275). While health and transportation typically do consider those issues, they are often left out of urban design (275). The latter point begins to reach towards the notion of a culture of walkability: perhaps I’ve been reading articles from the wrong discipline, although that doesn’t explain why my searches for “walking culture” and “culture of walking” in the library’s databases keep coming up short.

Forsyth contends that a confusion exists between the terms “walkable” and “walkability,” and that those conflicting definitions cause problems: “they affect how people try to create walkable places in practice, measure environmental walkability, and assess the costs and benefits of creating walkable environments. Practitioners and researchers may talk with great conviction about how to make environments walkable, but could well be proposing conflicting solutions” (275). The lack of clarity in these discussions “also makes it difficult to develop a theory to guide practice” (275).

Forsyth searched for the terms “walkability” and “walkable” online to find how those terms are defined (275). That process turned up clusters of definitions. The first cluster “includes themes or dimensions related to the community environment”: ideas of traversability (people can walk from one place to another without “major impediments”), compactness (distances to destinations are short), safety, and physically enticing environments (possessing sidewalks or paths, lighting, pedestrian crossings, and street trees, for instance) (276). Physically enticing environments “may also include interesting architecture, pleasant views and abundant services attractive to those who have other choices for getting around and getting exercise” (276). 

I’ve been toying with the term “density of texture” to describe those aspects of physically enticing environments: places with a density of texture are interesting in multiple ways (cognitively and sensorially). There are things to look at in such spaces, things to smell and taste and hear and touch, things to think about, surprises and novelty. Repeated visits to such places are repaid with new experiences, because they are in a constant state of flux and development. When I lived in Toronto, most of the walks I made were in spaces marked by a high degree of texture density. In the city where I live now, in contrast, the spaces are marked by a relatively low degree of texture density. Texture density in urban spaces is partly a function of population density, but a walk through an aspen bush or an unbroken grassland is also an experience of texture density, because there is so much to experience in those spaces. In contrast, a walk along a grid road lined with fields of canola or wheat is an experience of low texture density. Walks in spaces with low texture density tend to be considered boring, in my experience, and few people would want to walk in such spaces. Of course, this term is only a theory, and it is indebted to Michael Southworth’s notion of “path context” (Southworth 251-52). Perhaps some social scientist will come up with a method of measuring texture density. I’m not a social scientist, so I don’t have to measure texture density, though I know it when I experience it.

According to Forsyth, the second cluster of definitions speak to outcomes of walking. Those definitions see walkable environments as lively and sociable—“pleasant, clean, and full of interesting people”; sustainable; and healthy, because they induce exercise (276). Texture density might include having people to look at and interact with, but it needn’t be defined by pleasantness or cleanliness. A muddy path through a forest would have a high degree of texture density, but it’s not clean, as your boots will tell you when you get home. The final cluster of definitions uses walkability “as a kind of proxy for better design” (276). Those definitions make “very broad claims about outcomes”: they suggest that “walkability is multidimensional in terms of means” and that “these dimensions are measurable” (276). They also can use walkability as a sign of environments that are considered superior—“slower paced, more human scaled, healthier, and happier”—to others (276). 

Forsyth suggests that it’s possible to create a hierarchy out of these nine themes, since the first cluster of definitions tend to be preconditions for those in the second, and that the first and second clusters are combined in the third (276). However, most researchers “instead favor one or two of the definitions, using the same terms (walkable, walkability) to mean quite different things” (276). She also notes that there is a significant overlap between these nine themes, and between walkability itself and related terms, such as “pedestrian-oriented planning or pedestrian-oriented places” (277). 

“Some of the confusion over walkability is because of the issue of purposes and motivations,” Forsyth writes. “Walking can be done for many purposes such as transportation, exercise, and recreation. However, such purposes are often mixed” (277). In addition, “each purpose may have a different underlying motivation. For example, exercise or recreational walking may be done for stress reduction, increasing fitness, losing weight, getting out of the house, meeting people, even to enjoy a beautiful place” (277). Each purpose, and each motivation, one would think, “might be suited by a slightly different kind of walkable place” (277-78). Also, some walking purposes are rarely discussed in the literature on walkability, such as walking in “natural” areas for stress reduction, walking that is incidental to some other purpose (such as the walking done by people waiting on tables), or walking that occurs indoors (278). One could add walking that is carried out because of necessity, such as walking by people too poor to afford a vehicle, or by people who live in a place underserved by transit, or by people too young or too old to drive, or by refugees.

“It is unsurprising then that theories of walking are quite varied,” Forsyth continues (279). While some urban design theories assume that certain physical features of the environment will make people want to walk, “the field of health has created a number of different theories of behavior change, many of which focus on personal characteristics, individual behaviors, and social contexts, with the physical environment only incidental” (279). In that literature, everything—even clothing—is environmental (279). “This is an essential insight—that to create ‘walkable’ places, block and neighborhood designs are not enough in themselves,” Forsyth argues. “Rather, other scales of the environment are also important (for example clothing), and other kinds of strategies need to be enlisted such as programming, pricing, and other policies” (279). Restricting parking, making driving expensive, educating motorists, or providing supports to pedestrians might increase the amount of walking that takes place—that’s certainly one reason why dense urban centres (Toronto, in my experience, or London, in the study conducted by Jemima C. Stockton et al) see more walking trips. “Further, such factors as incomes, individual preferences, cultural values and climate also affect walking,” Forsyth states. Oh! A mention of “cultural values”! I want more of that. One cultural value, of course, is the way that walking is seen as normal, on one hand, or eccentric, on the other.

According to Forsyth, the nine themes in the various definitions of walkability “are reflected in the different kinds of planning and design for walkable environments” (279). Some forms of planning and design concentrate on specific components of the environment, such as sidewalks or crosswalks (279). But at the larger level of the neighbourhood or the city, “two main clusters of approaches contend for dominance”: “the fine-grained multi-functional street pattern seen in compact city, New Urbanist, Jane-Jacobs-inspired, mixed-use, transit oriented approaches that cluster people and destinations close together,” usually in a grid pattern; and, on the other hand, “the various forms of superblocks, where vehicular traffic is kept largely to the outside, or moves through with difficulty, and pedestrians infiltrate the center,” such as college campuses, pedestrianized downtowns, and various Modernist designs (279-80). Those two solutions are very different from each other, which leads Forsyth to conclude that “a walkable place is a complex and contested phenomenon” (280). The next section of the article “unpacks some of that complexity” (280).

First, Forsyth tackles the cluster of definitions related to conditions or means. Walkability in the sense of traversable “is about the very basic physical infrastructure to get from one place to another,” about whether “there is a continuous path with some reasonable surface and no major hazards” (280). What is considered traversable will depend on the walker’s age, preferences, whether the walker is encumbered with packages or pushing a stroller, the walker’s level of disability, the weather, time of day, the destination’s attractiveness, the perceived safety of the route, the availability of other options, hilliness, among other factors (280). Traversability, compactness, and safety “are related to a key purpose of walking: to get to a destination,” which is “a dominant view in transportation and an intuitive and commonsense definition” (280).

Compactness or closeness is related to traversability but different: they refer to walkability in terms of distance—whether “destinations are close enough to get to in a reasonable time on foot” (280). Of course, what’s a reasonable time will differ from person to person and from place to place. In any case, Forsyth suggests that a compact place—“with a high density or proximity of destinations and people”—will be considered walkable (280). Compactness also suggests “having an intensity of activities or destinations,” but it also requires “relatively direct and passable routes between those destinations (also raised in the prior theme)” (281). “Thus definitions of walkability as compactness often go beyond distance to include some combination of residential density and land use mixture along with a measure of connectivity (block size, intersection density, measures of gridded versus cul-de-sac street patterns, and the quality of paths),” Forsyth writes. However these definitions raise questions: “how compact a place needs to be and how close the destinations vary with a number of characteristics related to culture, perceptions, and the level of attraction of the destination(s), and the ability to pay for alternative modes of transportation” (281). Look! Another reference to culture! Besides, this definition is “biased toward walking for transportation,” rather than for recreation (281).

Next is safety. A lack of safety, both from crime and from traffic, Forsyth notes, is a barrier to walking (281). Both crime and traffic are important, but Forsyth focuses on traffic. “A Walkable environment in terms of traffic safety has some combination of low traffic volumes or protection for pedestrians (buffers, signalized crosswalks, traffic calming and the like),” she writes (282). This city has many crosswalks without signals of any kind, which are dangerous for pedestrians. Safety is important; according to Forsyth, some authors think it should be placed at the base of the hierarchy of walkability (282).

However, a walkable place “is often defined as something more than just traversable, compact, and safe”: it is also often considered a place “rich in pedestrian-oriented infrastructure, including wide and well-maintained sidewalks, active street frontages, traffic calming measures, street trees and vegetated buffers, marked and signalized pedestrian crossings, benches, way-finding signage, and pedestrian-scaled lighting” (282). These measures of a place being physically enticing, Forsyth’s fourth theme, include the other themes, particularly traversability and safety. Being physically enticing, though, ought to focus on the place being interesting as well as convenient—on the way it draws people to walk (282). Being physically enticing can also include the way a place enables sociability (282). This definition is important in “the media and design professions,” and it “assumes people are motivated to walk by certain forms of design—something that may be more true for some demographic groups, walking purposes, and regional locations” (283). 

The next cluster of themes focuses on outcomes (283). “Walking for socializing or just to be out and about in a lively environment near other people has a long history—for example, window shopping or promenading,” Forsyth writes. “In these definitions, when someone says they are improving walkability, or that a place is very walkable, they are referring to a general sense of liveliness, vitality, sociability, or vibrancy” (283). These features could be part of what I’ve been calling texture density, rightly or wrongly, although a walk alone in a forest would also be an experience of texture density, just like a stroll along the Ramblas in Barcelona. The literature that uses this definition of walkability proposes “that more walkable places have higher social capital or provide mental health benefits from interaction,” yet other writers argue that liveliness and walkability are different and need to be treated as such (283). Nevertheless, Forsyth states, “there is a great deal of overlap” between liveliness and walkability (283).

Another theme that focuses on outcomes is the notion of walkability being defined as a sustainable transportation option (283). Walkability is proposed as an alternative to the private automobile (283). Sustainability, Forsyth suggests, “is a complex outcome” and “may also be one of the many dimensions in a more holistic definition” (284).

The last outcome-oriented theme involves the extent to which a walkable environment induces people to exercise as part of their daily routine (284). But what counts as a walkable environment according to this theme isn’t the same for every person, purpose, or place (284). “A core interest in this literature is whether the increased transportation walking that people undertake in some kinds of more walkable locations can translate into increased overall physical activity,” Forsyth writes. “The results are complex. People certainly walk more for transportation in places with higher densities and accessible destinations,” and that may modestly increase physical activity (284). However, she notes that there may also be a self-selection bias at work, where people who want to walk move to places they consider walkable, which would magnify the effects of the environment (284). Also, it’s not clear that walking reduces obesity (284).

“The final set of definitions use walkability as a term to represent places that are complex and well-designed,” Forsyth continues (284). Multidimensionality and measurability is “a complex theme that obviously builds on prior categories” (284). The focus on measurability has “become a thriving industry among researchers, practitioners, and the wider public” (284). Many of the indices and measures used to measure walkability focus on walking for transportation, but some include recreational walking and transportation as well (285).

The last cluster of definitions uses walkability as “a proxy for better environments that generate investment, are more sustainable (in economic and social terms as well as environmental), and that are generally good places to be” (285). Such definitions can be objected to as too broad, but “they are commonly in use and are also the definitions most likely to stress the economic growth potential of walkability” (285). Thus, “this kind of walkability is an indicator of better urban areas that attract redevelopment, population increase and have high livability” (286). “It also avoids the question of incompatible outcomes of walkability, for example, if walkable places have higher housing costs they may have less vibrancy,” Forsyth suggests (286).

In her conclusion, Forsyth calls for “clear, shared definitions” of walkability “to foster dialog and understanding” (286). That might mean creating “a minimal definition of physical walkability focused on path condition/traversability and closeness with some basic level of safety” as “the core requirements for walking” (286). It might mean using “specific terms for different kinds of walkable places related either to features (for example compact) or to outcomes (for example exercise-supporting places)” (286). And it might mean developing “a comprehensive definition that moves beyond the kind of physical place that supports walking to also consider policies, programs, pricing and people (demographics, preferences, perceptions and so on)” (286). That definition might be more holistic but it would also be very complex.

Forsyth goes on to discuss how all of this affects the field of urban design. I’m not interested in that issue—I’m more interested in walking in the city I’ve got, not the city I’d like to have but never will—so I skipped that section and landed on her final thoughts. “Better defining walkability has several benefits,” she states: it would show “that walkable environments are not all the same,” it would illustrate “the biases and assumptions in some popular definitions of walkability,” it would demonstrate “that walkable environments for transportation and recreation purposes sometimes overlap but often do not,” and it would highlight the fact that “while walkability is defined in multiple ways, some major purposes of walking—such as restoration and walking that is incidental to other activities—are not well covered by such definitions and risk being left out of debates” (288). She calls on urban designers and others interested in walkability to “be more conscious about definitions” and to consider the “multiple dimensions” of walking and of walkability (288).

What is useful about this article? The two mentions of culture suggest that walking culture might be a thing, or that culture affects walking and whether people consider a place to be walkable or not. It also suggests the complexity of ideas about walkability. There is also a lengthy bibliography, but I can’t keep reading about walkability forever. Forsyth’s call for clearer definitions of walkability are unlikely to go anywhere, though, since the other terms she complains about as lacking specificity—community, culture, neighbourhood, suburbs—remain indistinct. Complex ideas often are expressed in multiple ways, and that multiplicity can lead to a lack of clarity. Such is life.

Works Cited

Forsyth, Ann. “What Is a Walkable Place? The Walkability Debate in Urban Design.” Urban Design International, vol. 20, no. 4, 2015, pp. 274-92. DOI: 10.1057/udi.2015.22.

Southworth, Michael. “Designing the Walkable City.” Journal of Urban Planning and Development, vol. 131, no. 4, 2005, pp. 246-57. DOI: 10.0161/(ASCE)0733-9488(2005)131:4(246).

Stockton, Jemima C. Oliver Duke-Williams, Emmanuel Stamatakis, Jennifer S. Mindell, Eric J. Brunner, and Nicola J. Shelton. “Development of a Novel Walkability Index for London, United Kingdom: Cross-sectional Application to the Whitehall II Study. ” BMC Public Health, vol. 16, no. 416, pp. 1-12. DOI: 10.1186/s12889-016-3012-12.

Kevin M. Leyden, “Social Capital and the Built Environment: The Importance of Walkable Neighborhoods”

Another article on walkability: this one, by Kevin M. Leyden, argues that walkable neighbourhoods encourage the development of social capital, meaning that they help people know their neighbours, participate in politics, trust others, and be more socially engaged (1546). The benefits of social capital don’t just accrue to the community: “People who are socially engaged with others and actively involved in their communities tend to live longer and be healthier physically and mentally” (1546). Leyden suggests the term “social capital” as a way of describing those social and community ties: he defines it as “the social networks and interactions that inspire trust and reciprocity among citizens” (1546). “Individuals with high levels of social capital tend to be involved politically, to volunteer in their communities, and to get together more frequently with friends and neighbors,” as well as “to trust or to think kindly of others” (1546). Social capital has been linked empirically to “the proper functioning of a democracy, the prevention of crime, and enhanced economic development” (1546). It’s very important, then, according to Leyden.

Leyden, a political scientist, wants to understand “why some persons and some communities have more social capital than others,” since it’s so important to public health (1546). He wants to examine “whether the built environment (i.e. the way we design and build our communities and neighborhoods) affects the degree to which people are involved in their communities and with each other” (1546). His “fundamental premise is that some neighborhood designs enable or encourage social ties or community connections, whereas others do not” (1546). His hypothesis is that mixed-use and pedestrian-friendly neighbourhoods are most likely to promote social capital (1546). Such neighbourhoods are typically found in older cities and rural towns (1546). “These neighborhoods are walkable, enabling residents to perform daily activities (e.g. grocery shopping, going to the park, taking children to school) without the use of a car,” he writes. “Many of these neighorhoods have places of worship, a local tavern, a coffee shop, or restaurants within walking distance” (1546). In other words, they have what Jemima Stockton and her co-authors describe as a higher land-use mix (see Stockton et al). Such neighbourhoods encourage walking, because pedestrians don’t have to complete with cars along busy highways or massive parking lots (1546). Thus, following Stockton and her co-authors again, we might describe them as having high levels of street connectivity or, following Mariela Alfonzo, we might suggest that they satisfy pedestrian needs for comfort and pleasurability (Alfonzo 828-30). 

Leyden compares “[t]his traditional or complete neighborhood design” to “its modern suburban counterpart,” in which daily needs are met by shopping in malls “located along 4-lane connector roads that are typically clogged with traffic” and where trips “to shop, worship, or go to a restaurant, pub, park or library” must be made by car (1546). “Many contemporary suburban subdivisions do not even have sidewalks: citizens must drive to find a place to exercise or to go for a walk,” he writes (1546). 

In theory, “pedestrian-oriented, mixed-use neighborhoods are expected to enhance social capital because they enable residents to interact,” either spontaneously or intentionally, and that interaction helps “to encourage a sense of trust and a sense of connection between people and the places they live” (1546). Those interactions build webs of public respect and trust (1546). However, in contrast, “most contemporary suburban subdivisions do little to enable social interaction,” particularly spontaneous ones, and life takes places “within the home or in the backyard” (1546-47). 

Leyden’s study “examined the relationship between neighborhood design and social capital” (1547). His hypothesis was “that pedestrian-oriented, mixed-use neighborhoods are more likely to encourage social capital than are car-dependent, single-use neighborhoods” (1547). He surveyed people in and around Galway, Ireland, in 2001 (1547). At the time, Galway was the country’s fastest growing cities in Europe (1547). He chose Galway because “it has a mix of neighborhood types ranging from the truly mixed-use, pedestrian-oriented variety (built centuries before the automobile) to the contemporary, American-style suburb,” and because the city has no history of racism of “white flight” that has “affected American cities and that in many ways continues to distort decisions regarding where to live” (1547). The survey was conducted by mail (1547). Galway’s neighbourhoods were divided into three categories: city centre neighbourhoods, including mixed-use, pedestrian-oriented neighbourhoods where people can meet their daily needs by walking short distances; older, mixed-use suburbs, which “incorporate some of the more positive aspects of both the traditional city center neighborhood and the quiet suburb”; and modern, car-dependent suburbs, where few places can be accessed on foot, and where some neighbourhoods don’t have sidewalks or parks (1547). By categorizing Galway’s neighbourhoods, Leyden ensured that the individuals surveyed lived in a range of neighbourhood types (1547). However, the determination of whether these neighbourhoods were walkable or not was made by the respondents (1547). The study measured four key aspects of social capital: “how well residents knew their neighbors, their political participation, their trust or faith in other people, and their social engagement” (1548). 

The results indicated that the research participants’ evaluations of the walkability of their neighbourhoods coincided with the researchers’ evaluations of those same neighbourhoods. In “traditional” neighbourhoods, people walked more (or at least perceived their neighbourhoods to be walkable), felt more connected to or part of their communities, were more likely to know their neighbours and to have trust or faith in other people, were more likely to contact elected officials to express their concerns, and were more likely to walk to work (1548-49). However, those simple mean comparisons do not control for other factors that might explain why residents in some neighbourhoods have more social capital, so Leyden used a multivariate method, which returned similar results: “the more places respondents reported being able to walk to in their neighborhood, the higher their level of social capital. This relation suggests that walkable, mixed-use neighborhoods are better generators of social capital than are modern, car-dependent suburbs” (1549). Thus, the more walkable a neighbourhood was—the more places someone could walk to—the more social capital that the neighbourhood generated (1549).“The neighborhood walkability measure had a statistically significant effect on all of the measures of social capital,” Leyden writes. “No other predictor was consistently significant. Moreover, neighborhood walkability consistently held its own in comparison with the other predictors, often playing a more powerful role” (1549). 

“This study suggests that the way we design and build our communities and neighborhoods affects social capital and thus physical and mental health,” Leydon concludes. “The results indicate that residents living in walkable, mixed-use neighborhoods are more likely to know their neighbors, to participate politically, to trust others, and to be involved socially” (1550). Unfortunately, though America’s built environment—and Canada’s—has, over the past decades, “been moving in a direction that is likely to have a negative effect on social capital” (1550). Many Americans have no choice but to live in “a modern, car-dependent suburb, because not enough viable, affordable traditional neighborhoods exist,” and modern, car-dependent suburbs are what most developers build (1550). It’s not just the fault of developers; “municipal zoning codes and other public policy changes” have promoted “transport by private vehicle,” rather than public transportation, and have discouraged, even outlawed, “the building of mixed-use, pedestrian-oriented neighborhoods” (1550). “Changing this trend will require political will and a shift in land-use and transportation priorities and policies,” Leyden writes, along with a shift in public consciousness, perhaps through government policy (1550). However, before that can happen, we need to know whether the results of this study can be generalized. Did selection bias, for instance, affect the results? Is it possible that “[s]ocial people might be more likely to choose walkable neighborhoods, rather th[a]n walkable neighborhoods’ encouraging sociability” (1550)? In addition, “much more must be learned about which architectural aspects of the built environment most affect health and social capital,” and indeed about the components of walkability: “measures such as block size, density, street widths, and traffic speed” (1550). “Finally, more data must be gathered regarding how the built environment affects health in general,” Leyden writes (1550). Does urban sprawl affect peoples’ life spans (1550)? How does it affect young people or the elderly (1550)? “The consequences of not walking and of not interacting with others may have consequences far more negative, for persons of all ages, than we ever imagined,” he states (1550).

Somehow, and I don’t know how to do this, I want to extend Leyden’s argument from a discussion of social capital to one of walking culture. If places are walkable, then are people more likely to incorporate walking into their daily lives? And would that quotidian walking create a culture where walking is normal and not unusual or eccentric? Might such a culture include events, like heritage or tourism walks, the kinds of events that Wrights & Sites react against, that they want to subvert with psychogeography or mythogeography (see Wrights & Sites)? The city where I live is not that walkable—most of it resembles the car-dependent suburban neighbourhoods Leyden describes—and for that reason, does it lack the culture of walking that may exist in older neighbourhoods in Galway? I think it does, but how would one go about proving such a thing? I turn to yet another article, hoping to find a clue, frustrated that nobody (as far as I can tell) has ever asked this question before.

Works Cited

Alfonzo, Mariela A. “To Walk or Not to Walk? The Hierarchy of Walking Needs.” Environment and Behavior, vol. 37, no. 6, 2005, pp. 808-836. DOI: 10.1177/0013916504274016.

Leyden, Kevin M. “Social Capital and the Built Environment: The Importance of Walkable Neighborhoods.” American Journal of Public Health, vol. 93, no. 9, 2003, pp. 1546-51. Proquest.

Stockton, Jemima C. Oliver Duke-Williams, Emmanuel Stamatakis, Jennifer S. Mindell, Eric J. Brunner, and Nicola J. Shelton. “Development of a Novel Walkability Index for London, United Kingdom: Cross-sectional Application to the Whitehall II Study. ” BMC Public Health, vol. 16, no. 416, pp. 1-12. DOI: 10.1186/s12889-016-3012-12.

Wrights & Sites. “A Manifesto for a New Walking Culture: ‘Dealing With the City.’” Performance Research, vol. 11, no. 2, 2006, pp. 115-22. DOI: 10.1080/13528160600812083.

Salmiah Abdul Hamid, “Walking in the City of Signs: Tracking Pedestrians in Glasgow”

Another day, another article on walking in the city: this time, it’s Salmiah Abdul Hamid’s discussion of walking behaviour in Glasgow. One of my hunches—hypotheses, if you want to get fancy about it—is that there’s a culture of walking in the UK that is absent where I live in Canada. I’m having trouble moving that idea beyond a hypothesis, and since I’m not a social scientist, I don’t have the tools to conduct a study to support that contention, but I’m slowly finding enough support to put some meat on its bones—some boots on its feet, perhaps.

Hamid asks, “Have you ever walked in your hometown in search of a new restaurant suggested to you by your colleagues?” (264). Well, in my city, you probably would drive, rather than walk, but because Glasgow is more densely populated, has greater degrees of street connectivity, and has a greater land-use mix (see Stockton et al), as I know from my experience walking in both places, you might decide to walk to that new destination. Hamid suggests that while searching for that restaurant, a pedestrian “might be overwhelmed by the multitude of existing ‘signs’” (264). “I would suggest that users of the semiotic environment use different approaches to move about,” Hamid suggests (264). That seems to be his hypothesis.

Hamid studied pedestrian activity in the city centre of Glasgow. “Given the large geographical scale of Glasgow, there are more activities in the city centre such as shopping or arts and cultural performances,” he writes. “In terms of the urban context, Glasgow is very ‘pedestrian-friendly,’” with broad sidewalks (264) and large areas that are closed to vehicular traffic. “In this study, the empirical investigation into how signs influence human mobility in an urban environment was conducted through tracking pedestrians’ routes on foot,” he continues (264). His research had two objectives: to investigate how pedestrians act when they are searching for directions in cities, and to explore “mobile methods applications” for tracking their movements (264). 

First, Hamid sets out his theoretical framework. “The way a pedestrian navigates within a space depends on the complexity of the space and how the pedestrian understands the space,” he writes (265). Pedestrians choose routes because they might be scenic or familiar, or because they are short (265). Pedestrians ignore street signs that are not relevant to them, since the majority of street signs address motorists (265). Orientation is important for pedestrians: it consists of signs and verbal aids (like asking for directions), recognition of patterns of location, habitual patterns of behaviour, and landmarks (265). Because elements of the built environment influence pedestrians’ movements and orientation, their behaviour “depends on the individual’s preferences regarding moving between spaces,” whether they are familiar and mundane or more meaningful (265). 

“Understanding bodily movement in urban spaces helps us to better understand social practices,” Hamid writes. He wants to know how people navigate the “at times overwhelming milieu” of the city (265). He cites Georg Simmel’s suggestion that most city dwellers “who walk along the same streets in their daily lives tend to be more inattentive of their surroundings” (265). Simmel’s work dates back to the 1880s, but Hamid suggests it may still be relevant (265). 

Next Hamid describes mobile ethnographic methods, which use a combination of field notes and still and video documentation. The point of using these methods is to “capture, track, simulate, and mimic” the behaviour of pedestrians in urban spaces as they search for their destinations (266). He makes a big deal out of using iPads for this work, although he notes that the devices have “limited functions and capabilities” (266). It’s not yet clear to me how he tracked the behaviour of pedestrians; I’m still hopeful, though, that he will explain his methodology more clearly.

Apparently, his research considered “the flow of pedestrians, the streetscape designed for pedestrians as well as the road signs within the perimeter of the urban context study,” so he documented the behaviour of pedestrians towards “the materials in place such as road signs” by using iPads to photograph and write notes (266). The study participants were randomly selected, and were both people walking alone ind in groups (268). He (or his graduate students) stood on street corners on Gordon Street in Glasgow’s city centre (near the central train station) and studied and observed peoples’ behaviour. Some of those people “referred to the city map on the street in order to reach their destination while others used their mobile phone or printed map to search for their destination” or asked other pedestrians for directions (268). Pedestrians were also traced using mobile tracking software on the iPad (268). 

As a result of this study, Hamid argues that “most pedestrians considered few important elements when searching for directions,” including street names, street maps, and street signs (268). Many pedestrians ignored lights at crosswalks telling them not to cross the street (268). Street map signs “are the most important element in Glasgow to guide pedestrians to specific locations in the city centre,” and most pedestrians looked at street names, maps, or at landmark buildings (269). “However, in terms of the regulated traffic signs, most of the pedestrians were not obliged to follow the signs even though the signs are placed at the pedestrian zones,” he states (269). 

Hamid conducts a “geosemiotics analysis” (269). He notes that many street signs had been tampered with by adding posters or stickers, which suggests to him that those signs were not respected by pedestrians (270). Pedestrians who were familiar with their routes ignored the signs, while pedestrians who were unfamiliar with their route (how did he know who was familiar and who wasn’t just by observing them?) paid attention to the signs. Many asked others for help or directions (270). Some pedestrians used multiple methods to find their way (271). Some pedestrians used mobile phones to figure out where they were going (271). Some pedestrians were followed and their behaviour was observed: one pair of men, who seemed to get lost looking for a restaurant, still laughed together despite their long journey (271). “Despite all the observations and tracking the bodily movement of pedestrians in Glasgow, there is still a gap in terms of the cognitive understanding,” Hamid writes. “How do we know that they understood the meaning of the signs in relation to the street maps, or whether there is a lack of informational guidance on the street which if present could ease the pedestrians’ journey and destination search [?]” (272). 

Hamid seems surprised that people still use paper maps rather than their mobile phones or GPS technology (273). He notes that most of the traffic signs “were posted with ‘transgressive notices’”—in other words, that they had been vandalized—but they were still legible for pedestrians (273). Drivers paid attention to the traffic signs, but pedestrians and cyclists tended not to (273). However, he notes that his methodology made it “impossible to determine whether the pedestrians . . . understood the meanings of the signs or whether the signs were placed inappropriately or whether the pedestrians referred to the signs for guidance” (273). Men and women seemed to use the signs differently, but “it was not possible to gain any insights into the pedestrians’ thought processes when navigating the spaces” (273). For that reason, short interviews would have been useful (273). 

“This paper helps to determine the natural behavior of pedestrians in their daily life through non-participant observations,” Hamid concludes (276). Mobile methods are valuable for this kind of research (276). More research is needed “to understand why and what people think and the relationship between the signs and places in a more dynamic approach and setting” (276). 

This paper turned out to be pretty thin gruel—the results seem to suggest little more than what a self-aware pedestrian might conclude while walking around in Glasgow’s city centre—but then again, I’m not a social scientist and therefore not part of the paper’s intended audience. The reference to Georg Simmel might be useful, but the most interesting part of the paper, for my purposes, is the way the paper reminds me of how much people walk in Glasgow’s city centre. However, as I recall, outside that area I saw fewer pedestrians—not none, but not as many as one sees on Buchanan Street or George Street. I could write down my memories of walking in Glasgow, compare them to what it’s like walking in Regina, and call it autoethnography. And, in fact, if I can’t find any explication anywhere of a thing called a “walking culture,” that’s what I might end up having to do.

Works Cited

Hamid, Salmiah Abdul. “Walking in the City of Signs: Tracking Pedestrians in Glasgow.” Current Urban Studies, no. 2, 2014, pp. 263-78. DOI: 10.4236/cus.2014.23025.

Stockton, Jemima C. Oliver Duke-Williams, Emmanuel Stamatakis, Jennifer S. Mindell, Eric J. Brunner, and Nicola J. Shelton. “Development of a Novel Walkability Index for London, United Kingdom: Cross-sectional Application to the Whitehall II Study. ” BMC Public Health, vol. 16, no. 416, pp. 1-12. DOI: 10.1186/s12889-016-3012-12.

Jemima C. Stockton, Oliver Duke-Williams, Emmanuel Stamatakis, Jennifer S. Mindell, Eric J. Brunner, and Nicola J. Shelton, “Development of a Novel Walkability Index for London, United Kingdom: Cross-sectional Application to the Whitehall II Study”

I’m still trying to figure out walkability—specifically, whether cities in the UK, where participatory and convivial art walking is, as social scientists say, salient, are more walkable than the city where I live, and whether that might be one reason those art walking forms are so important. The authors of this study—and I hope they explain what the “Whitehall II Study” is, or was, because I have no idea—begin by defining walking as “a form of transport, with physical activity a healthy ‘side-effect’” (2). They note that studies of the connections between urban form and physical activity have been studied, but those studies have focused on North America and Australia, rather than the United Kingdom, and that London’s urban form—its age and the way its growth has been restrained by a greenbelt—has a form that is different from the cities that have been studied in the past (2).

“Walking is associated with physical environmental attributes such as greater diversity in land use (land use mix), greater street connectivity, and higher residential density,” the authors state (2). Greater land use mix is important because it enables “better access to services and employment” and induces “shorter within-neighbourhood travel by foot when a range of destinations is located near residences” (2). In such neighbourhoods, walking is likely to be more efficient than motorized transportation (2). Street connectivity, on the other hand, “relates to the feasibility of walking from one point to another: the more connected the streets, the more direct the route through the neighbourhood and the greater the walkability” (2). Finally, higher residential density creates “a more walkable environment by providing a critical mass of walkers seen by other people who are, in turn, encouraged by safety in numbers to walk as well” (2). That kind of density does not exist where I live, which means there is no “critical mass of walkers” whose example encourages others to walk—except in the park and along the creek. However, the authors continue, “physical environmental attributes should not be measured in isolation because they do not always reflect one another, and may be insifficient individually to promote physical activity” (2). For instance, greater street connectivity may not encourage walking if people lack a variety of places to visit—if, in other words, the land mix is not particularly high (2).

“Walkability indices are designed to reflect these various elements by capturing the multiple attributes of a place for which there is evidence for a positive association with walking or cycling,” the authors tell us (2). That’s interesting, but of course I find myself wondering about negative associations with walking: what makes places unwalkable, rather than what makes them walkable. A variety of such indices has been developed, but residential density, street connectivity and land use mix “are salient across populations and form the basis of a majority of indices” (2). They note that the typical land uses that “are included in the land use mix component” are heterogenous, consisting of residential, commercial, institutional and recreational uses (2). The evidence for positive associations between walkability and walking, they state, comes mostly from outside Europe and is therefore not appropriate to a city like London (2). Nevertheless, European research on this issue is “generally concordant” with non-European studies (2), although walkability remains “understudied in European cities” (3).

“Investigating associations between neighbourhood physical environments and walking also requires consideration of the spatial scale: how the neighbourhood is operationalised to capture exposures in an area that is sensitive to walking,” the authors continue (3). They suggest that most adults consider one kilometre a walkable distance, and they will “perceive areas within this distance from home to be a part of the neighbourhood” (3). However, that doesn’t mean that a one-kilometre circle around someone’s house constitutes their neighbourhood, because that measurement takes no account of areas that are inaccessible to pedestrians (3). Thus, administrative areas “constitute the most common operationalisation of neighbourhood in investigations between physical environments and walking” because they “are ‘ready-made’ and often have aggregated environmental measurements available” (3). “Whilst not ideal, the use of administrative areas as the spatial units of a walkability index provides independence from the study participants for whom associations with walking are examined: walkability is not limited to the potentially narrow range of participants’ neighbourhoods,” they state (3). For that reason, their research uses administrative areas as its basis in order “to build a walkability index for London,” using data from the Whitehall II Study to measure associations between walkability and walking (3). Their hypothesis was “that there would be a gradual radial decay in walkability of London from the centre to the periphery, reflecting reductions in residential dwelling density and street connectivity,” and that there would be a “positive association between walkability and time spent walking per week,” particularly in areas with greater land use mix (3).

Whitehall II, they explain, “is an ongoing longitudinal study of civil servants to examine the social determinants of health” (3). It has been going on since 1985 (3). Part of the questionnaire that participants answer asks about physical activity, including the “frequency and duration of walking over the past 4 weeks” (4). The duration and frequency of walking combined constituted walking volume (4). “Walkability indices for London were produced at three spatial scales of contiguous administrative areas (i) 21,140 output areas, (ii) 633 census area statistics (CAS) wards and (iii) 33 local authorities,” the authors tell us. “At each scale, three walkability models were constructed . . . containing the fixed components of residential dwelling density and street connectivity. In addition, each contained a land use mix component that included a different set of land uses” (4). Each successive model included more land uses (4).The city was mapped extensively in order to calculate street connectivity and residential density (4-5).

I skipped over the methodology section of the article—I don’t have the statistical background for it—and landed on the study’s results. The authors’ hypothesis that walkability would be highest in the centre of the city and lower elsewhere proved to be accurate (not surprisingly) (7, 9). To their knowledge, “this study is the first to construct and test a walkability index for the European city of London based on indices developed in non-European contexts,” the authors state. “The significant association between walkability and walking that remained even after adjustment for individual-level sociodemographic factors and for area deprivation represents a novel finding, and one that confirms the validity of the walkability tool constructed in the context of London, UK” (8). People without cars were more likely to walk, perhaps because they lacked other means of transportation, but it’s also possible that in areas with high residential density, street connectivity, and land use mix, people have less of a need for a car (8). However, it seems that people tended to walk more in neighbourhoods that were more walkable (9). However, the authors acknowledge that the study didn’t determine which land uses included in the land-use mix were related to walkability (9). In addition, because participants did not report where they walked, just how much, it’s possible they were walking outside of their neighbourhoods (10). 

“In the context of the most populous city in Europe, the significant association between walkability and walking . . . highlights the potential importance of the physical environment of the neighbourhood in eliciting physical activity in individuals and thereby promoting public health at a population level,” the authors conclude. “The most basic walkability index model constructed here may offer urban planners and public health professionals a simple tool in building and maintaining healthy neighbourhoods” (10).

The connections between residential density, street connectivity, and land-use mix, on one hand, and walkability and walking, on the other, suggests that certain kinds of urban environments—densely populated places with high levels of street connectivity and a diverse land-use mix—are likely to be more walkable than urban environments that lack those features. Most of the city where I live isn’t densely populated, levels of street connectivity are low, and the land-use mix tends not to be complex; therefore, that city is less walkable than, say, central London. That seems obvious. I still wonder, though, about how walkable places create cultures of walking—attitudes towards walking that see it as normal and typical rather than eccentric—and whether such cultures of walking might encourage people to participate in art walking practices that push back against functional forms of walking in favour of walking that is more mythogeographic or psychogeographic. I am beginning to see how I might bolt this research together to make an argument, but I think I’m going to need a few more pieces before I’m confident about making those connections.

Works Cited

Stockton, Jemima C. Oliver Duke-Williams, Emmanuel Stamatakis, Jennifer S. Mindell, Eric J. Brunner, and Nicola J. Shelton. “Development of a Novel Walkability Index for London, United Kingdom: Cross-sectional Application to the Whitehall II Study. ” BMC Public Health, vol. 16, no. 416, pp. 1-12. DOI: 10.1186/s12889-016-3012-12.