Cities have more young people and a higher proportion of women than rural areas (women are more likely to walk or use public transportation than men). The researchers have t6o do better than just look at two variables, see that they correlate and jump right to drawing conclusions.
Why People in Cities Walk Fast (2012)
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Re: Why People in Cities Walk Fast (2012)
#22In crowded environments when you go slow you feel bad that you're making people go around you. So your speed naturally climbs to the speed of the faster people. Even if there are few of them the overall speed will increase.
Subways just have flow speeds.
Re: Why People in Cities Walk Fast (2012)
#23Maybe it's just how many people are late for work/appointments they measure. Travel time is less predictable in the city.
But actually I think it's a mix: more dates in peoples lifes, wanting to flee the noise (little joy in transit on foot), false urgency to catch public transit because murphies lets you remember all the times you just so missed the tram, as noted by others: more transit by foot in the city in general because of public transport.
Re: Why People in Cities Walk Fast (2012)
#24I think it would be interesting to see not just the average but also the distribution of walking speeds. I posit the effect might just be “number of people walking to/from work or arrival time sensitive activity.”, with “average age” and “adoption of mass transit” as significant factors. (Mass transit because you’re more likely to see commuters! Outside big cities you will measure fewer people walking to work, becaus…
I think there's a secondary aspect here as well. I walk a lot and always have. And while I almost never feel I need to walk 'fast', I've observed that my comfortable walking pace is a lot faster than most people I know who don't walk every day, even when I'm in no particular hurry.
Re: Why People in Cities Walk Fast (2012)
#25I'm surprised they don't mention the obvious practical reason. I walk faster when I'm in the city because I have farther to go. Last week, I was working in a smaller city 30 miles out. So I drove, and out in the suburbs, I can park pretty close to where I'm going. Today, I was working in the city, a mile from home. At that distance, there's a good chance I wouldn't be able to find parking any closer to where I'm goin…
"a mile from home. At that distance, there's a good chance I wouldn't be able to find parking any closer to where I'm going"
Would you drive, just to travel a mile? Barely seems worth it in the best case. That's without getting into the environmental and social issues.
Re: Why People in Cities Walk Fast (2012)
#26Muggers consistently choose targets based on how they walk. This is shown to be the case even if other physical information is hidden during the research: http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20131104-how-muggers-size-up... To avoid attack, move with "synchrony and energy", with purpose. The city people are doing exactly this.
I just realized that I walk this way whenever I'm traveling in an unfamiliar place and find that I've chosen a route through a sketchy part of town.
I'll walk straight through at a brisk pace with a little bit of a scowl on my face as though I'm annoyed to have to be crossing this same area of town again and none of these f'ng people had better get in my f'ng way.
Now I know why I do that.
Re: Why People in Cities Walk Fast (2012)
#27I'm surprised they don't mention the obvious practical reason. I walk faster when I'm in the city because I have farther to go. Last week, I was working in a smaller city 30 miles out. So I drove, and out in the suburbs, I can park pretty close to where I'm going. Today, I was working in the city, a mile from home. At that distance, there's a good chance I wouldn't be able to find parking any closer to where I'm goin…
"a mile from home. At that distance, there's a good chance I wouldn't be able to find parking any closer to where I'm going" Would you drive, just to travel a mile? Barely seems worth it in the best case. That's without getting into the environmental and social issues.
If parking were easily available & free, then whats the downside? 15 min + a bit of effort versus 5 min and no effort... and you have the convenience of having a car nearby for your next thing (eg lunch).
The choice seems obvious to me.
Re: Why People in Cities Walk Fast (2012)
#28Related book recommendation: A geography of time
Re: Why People in Cities Walk Fast (2012)
#29Doesn't it seem like somewhere out there is a company with a lot of data on people's walking speed, which could just bury these studies with orders of magnitude more data? Some smartphone app or similar device for counting steps, or maybe just Google Maps when you're using the pedestrian option to plot your path.
Google has a lot of data from the Google Maps timeline and also from Google Fit.
Re: Why People in Cities Walk Fast (2012)
#30I think it would be interesting to see not just the average but also the distribution of walking speeds. I posit the effect might just be “number of people walking to/from work or arrival time sensitive activity.”, with “average age” and “adoption of mass transit” as significant factors. (Mass transit because you’re more likely to see commuters! Outside big cities you will measure fewer people walking to work, becaus…
I think there's a secondary aspect here as well. I walk a lot and always have. And while I almost never feel I need to walk 'fast', I've observed that my comfortable walking pace is a lot faster than most people I know who don't walk every day, even when I'm in no particular hurry.
I can confirm it and have to add that it's the same with riding my bike. Moving at a "normal" speed becomes even somewhat hard when with other people who always tell you to slow down (because when you are not paying attention, you are already speeding up again).