Cool Ped Stuff #10: Bloggers

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And you thought I was the only one crazy enough to spend my spare time writing about pedestrians. No indeed, there's quite a confederation of us out there. I've listed some of these in my blogroll, but I think all of them are worth checking out (with the help of google translate, if necessary).

In English:
TBD on Foot (Washington, DC)
Pedestrianist (San Francisco, CA)
Twin City Sidewalks (Minneapolis/St. Paul. MN)
Walk Around Portland (Portland, ME)
Coeur d'Alene Pedestrian & Bicycle Blog (Coeur d'Alene, ID)
WalkBikeJersey Blog

In Spanish:
Pedestre "Pedestrian" (Mexico City, Mexico)
Diario de un Peaton "Everday Life of a Pedestrian" (Madrid, Spain)

SCAG Ped Planning Goes 2.0

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For those of you who dream of writing a Regional Transportation Plan (or is that just me?), SCAG has finally given you a chance with its new Bike Ped Wiki. Just create a user profile, sign in, and you're free to add your own thoughts, edits, pictures, and any other content you can come up with to the wiki, which will ultimately be incorporated into the official plan next summer. The kind folks at SCAG have populated the pages with some content to get you started, but the rest is up to you.

This Week on Foot

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This week began with sad news as 2 teenagers' lives intersect with tragic results in Sherman Oaks. The death of 16-year-old Conor Lynch during a cross country practice led the LA Times to note that Cross-country runners face risk on L.A. streets. True. And so do the rest of us, like the Pedestrian hit by car in Bellflower hospitalized


And it's not just cars that are a problem. In Washington state Bikes, pedestrians clash on campus at Whitman College. Even parking lots can be dangerous, like this one in Richmond where a Pedestrian hit by car, pinned in parking lot mishap.

Fortunately, people around the world are working to address these dangers. In Palm Springs, Pedestrians to have easier time crossing streets due to the installation of some new, decorative crosswalks, while in San Francisco the Glen Park plans leave out cars, put focus on pedestrians. 
New York Officials eye more pedestrian-friendly city in order to keep residents happy (and stop them from leaving town). Even El Paso Project Promises To Bring Different Downtown Concept

Our friends in India continue to be successful in their efforts to improve pedestrian safety in that country. In Bangalore, Pedestrian-operated lights soon at 30 junctions. Meanwhile, in Canada Worsley students focus on walkability, and get to hang out with Colombia's pedestrian extraordinaire, Gil Penalosa.
  
And if you've been wondering where to do your Halloween-night walking, Zillow has released its second annual list of best places for trick-or-treating. In case you were wondering, LA ranks 14th, right behind San Diego.

Want to Avoid Dementia in Later Life? Take a Walk.

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A longitudinal study of older adults (average age 78) released this month in the journal Neurology shows that walking at least 72 blocks a week, or six to nine miles, leads to greater volumes of grey matter--and less memory loss--over time. About 40 percent of study participants developed some form of dementia over the course of the study, but those who had more grey matter because of walking reduced their risk of cognitive impairment by two-fold.

So at least now we have some evidence that creating pedestrian-friendly environments is important for public health.

Will a Walkable Neighborhood Make Me Skinny?

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Well, it's hard to say...but it will definitely make me skinny. That's because I live in a walkable neighborhood and I value walking. It's that last part that is the key to low Body Mass Index (BMI), according to this recently published study from the International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity. Living in a walkable community isn't enough. You also have to want to walk.

First, some background. It's clearly established that there is a relationship between walkable communities and walking. A pedestrian-friendly neighborhood has more pedestrians, plain and simple. What's less clear is why exactly this is so. Is there more walking in pedestrian-friendly neighborhoods because people who already like to walk a lot move into them? Or does walkable community design cause erstwhile couch potatoes to get up and move? A growing body of evidence suggests it's the former of these two possibilites that explain the high walking rates in pedestrian-friendly communities, and this study adds to that evidence.