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Is Seattle a 15-minute city? It depends on where you want to walk

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Re: Is Seattle a 15-minute city? It depends on where you want to walk

#361

Post by lotsoweiners »

gen220 wrote: post #278
com2kid wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Building dense cities that can be accessed by bike and on foot would have the same effect. I love density, but, in my experience this is not true. London doesn't have a large competitive market of grocery stores. Neither does Boston or New York City. Density means higher real estate prices, that means grocery store sizes go down, and the barrier to entry goes up. Yes you can get more small specialty shops (which is…

From NYC, within a 15 minute walk from my door: - Whole Foods - Key Food - 2-3 specialty grocers (think italian importers, etc.) - gourmet grocer - two butcher shops and a fresh fish shop - CVS (yes, they sell groceries! spooky) - 2-3 bodegas that sell shelf-stable goods, as well as a small collection of fruit and vegetables If you go expand it to 15 minute bike, the world is truly your oyster, but the primary one th…

Sure but everyone would expect that in New York but people on here tend to miss that suburbs can be walkable too. I live in the most suburban neighborhood 25 miles away from central Phoenix that you could possibly imagine and have a 15 minute walk to 2 full size grocery stores, several bars, a wide variety of restaurants, plenty (an understatement) of medical offices, coffee shops etc. 20 minutes gets me to Walmart, a movie theater, and tons more. Having been to New York many times I strongly prefer the walk through tree lined, low traffic and noise streets that I have here.

Re: Is Seattle a 15-minute city? It depends on where you want to walk

#362

Post by loeg »

dweinus wrote: post #326
loeg wrote: post #306

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"And are also unsafe to walk on," though? Most of those are residential streets with low traffic. I lived in that area and ran around somewhat regularly for several years. The street I mentioned as the worst one is in that district. :-)

Unfortunately so. There are some egregious ones up there like that, but also if you step one block off of any major thoroughfare the sidewalk ends, yet there is still consistent traffic. This includes streets that connect schools, libraries, parks, etc. There were 271 pedestrian injuries in Seattle last year, 17 were fatal. Source: https://remoteapps.wsdot.wa.gov/highwaysafety/collision/data...

> There are some egregious ones up there like that, but also if you step one block off of any major thoroughfare the sidewalk ends, yet there is still consistent traffic.

Sure, but again, those streets by and large did not feel unsafe to me (on foot).

> There were 271 pedestrian injuries in Seattle last year, 17 were fatal.

This datapoint is just not responsive to the discussion, unless you're saying those injuries happened specifically on non-sidewalked streets in north Seattle? I suspect most were in the street or crosswalks in busier parts of town.

Re: Is Seattle a 15-minute city? It depends on where you want to walk

#363

Post by loeg »

teucris wrote: post #313
loeg wrote: post #306

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"And are also unsafe to walk on," though? Most of those are residential streets with low traffic. I lived in that area and ran around somewhat regularly for several years. The street I mentioned as the worst one is in that district. :-)

There are dozens of pockets of streets with no sidewalks that seem safe until you find that they are significant overflow routes (of which there are many given Seattle’s various traffic struggles)

I was curious if you had any examples in mind.

Re: Is Seattle a 15-minute city? It depends on where you want to walk

#366

Post by danielodievich »

watermelon59 wrote: post #154
teucris wrote: post #114

Incredible analysis! As a Seattleite I can say the conclusions here are very close to accurate, with the key additional note being that distance is not the only thing that defines walkability. Seattle has some of the most confounding civil engineering I’ve ever seen, and I’ve lived in five cities and visited dozens more. Here are some things that make a pedestrian life near impossible in my neighborhood: - two high-t…

Seattle has so many intersections that are completely bonkers. They’re not only poorly walkable, they also make driving extremely stressful.

My favorite intersection in Seattle is the most awesome Bellevue/Bellevue/Bellevue. Yes it's real https://goo.gl/maps/o4doz6JNfaezyRjf8

Re: Is Seattle a 15-minute city? It depends on where you want to walk

#367

Post by tiffanyh »

battery_glasses wrote: post #281

This underscores how important small businesses are to the health of a city. I live a in less walkable neighborhood on this map - but about a year ago a small (tiny really, ~700sqft) corner store opened up 2 blocks from me. It sells coffee, pastry, simple sandwiches, but also pantry staples (flour, sugar, milk etc.) and has a really good beer and wine selection. I can't do my normal grocery shopping there, but being…

7-11 or CVS/Walgreens fills this void in a lot of US geographies.

They aren’t as personalized or localized as the neighborhood place, but the use case you describe is exactly the market 7-11/CVS/Walgreens is going after.

Re: Is Seattle a 15-minute city? It depends on where you want to walk

#368

Post by danny_codes »

blakesterz wrote: post #5
duxup wrote: post #2

I like the idea of walking 15 minutes to get all the things. But man when I think of the costs involved in making sure there is a High School (in the US they tend to be large and draw from a distance) within 15 minutes of everywhere (no small cost to drop in a high school somewhere), or plop down a grocery store in a neighborhood ... that sounds both super expensive and politically difficult, and for some good reason…

I was thinking the same thing. This doesn't seem like it's a realistic goal, as much as I do really like the idea. 15 minutes of walking isn't really much in terms of feet or meters or however you want to measure it. 15 minutes of biking time, that's better. I guess I live in a "15 Minute Area" if you only count the bike time. Maybe more like 20 if you count the time I end up sitting at intersections?

Better bike infrastructure really unlocks a lot of potential. With good bike infrastructure, rides of ~30 minutes are quite comfortable, which is a distance of about 4 miles.

IMO a well-designed city could easily keep all necessary amenities in that range.

Re: Is Seattle a 15-minute city? It depends on where you want to walk

#369

Post by genuine_smiles »

zw123456 wrote: post #338

When I first started reading this article, I'll admit, the first thought, as a life-long Seattlite, that crossed my mind was, here we go again, some dumbass writes about what it is like to live in Seattle. Goddamit. But when I saw the chart that showed walking distance to a park at the top of the list then I started to realize this one hit the mark. I actually purchased the home that I did because it is one block fro…

Which park is it?

Re: Is Seattle a 15-minute city? It depends on where you want to walk

#370

Post by ianburrell »

dag11 wrote: post #345
bluGill wrote: post #344

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Probably cars as a whole. Based on other such places (I know nothing about Seattle) they have no clue what cars are costing, but they know some people get there by car so they are scared to lose them.

The parking spots at Pike Place dwarf in comparison to the crowds the market serves. Here's a maps screenshot[1] where I've highlighted the parking available there[2]. Meanwhile the market serves ~10m annual pre-pandemic visitors[3], which averages to 27k daily visitors. The amount of visitors coming in by car are negligible. [1] https://i.imgur.com/HYrANj7.jpg [2] https://goo.gl/maps/aqoNGXTLCxgD5XdW7 [3] https://en…

There is also a whole parking garage downhill from the market. Much bigger than the parking available out front.

It would make a lot of sense to pedestrianize Pike Pl and maybe couple of surrounding streets.

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