Understanding the Economic Value of Walkable Cities

Roper, Josephine; Pettit, Chris; Ng, Matthew Kok Ming

doi:10.1007/978-3-030-76059-5_15

Cited by 2 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 33 publications

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“…In recent years, much academic work has used commercialized indexes with proprietary algorithms such as Walkscore, which do not provide a transparent methodology with full details of the algorithms, data inputs and their currency, and thus do not enable critique (Kitchin, 2017), or advances in measurement approaches. A recent review of studies comparing residential property prices to walkability metrics found 20 papers of which 12 used Walkscore-nine as the only metric, three as one of several comparators (Roper et al 2021).…”

Section: Open and Reproducible Index Methodologymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Future research will also test the comparative performance of WalkTHERE in property value modeling, to see if performance improves over that previously found with Walkscore and whether exploration of model parameters can provide clues to understanding apparent inconsistencies or idiosyncrasies produced by the Walkscore property pricing correlation (Roper et al, 2021).…”

Section: Future Researchmentioning

confidence: 96%

“…This has the strength of using current provision of different types of destinations as a guide to residents' needs but does not allow for comparison of absolute destination numbers between cities. We think that a person who can access, say 100,000 jobs has more access than one who can access 10,000, even if they both represent 10% of the jobs in their respective cities (Levinson & Wu, 2020), and this is borne out by on average higher land prices in larger cities (given that land markets are a way to measure the benefits of access to individuals (Roper et al, 2021)). The proportion approach is also not able to measure walkability improvements that occur simultaneously with growth in destination numbers.…”

Section: Finite Scale and Diminishing Returns To Opportunitiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Incorporating diminishing returns to opportunities in access: Development of an open-source walkability index based on multi-activity accessibility

Roper,

Ng,

Pettit

2023

JTLU

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In this paper, we argue for an explicit decoupling of “walkability” and “walking behavior” and for the advantages of a definition of walkability based on access. This provides impetus for a new approach to constructing and using walkability indices, combining accessibility theory with a goal of comprehensiveness and communicability. Diminishing returns-to-opportunities can be used to map the infinite origin-destination gravity potential space to a finite scale thus creating an easily communicable metric, or metrics. In addition, this method can be applied to any mode and applied to multiple destination types singly or combined. Application of this theoretical approach is demonstrated through the creation of a novel comprehensive open-source transport walking potential index, WalkTHERE. A 0-100 scale is used to represent the percentage of people’s total needs potentially accessible by walking. The index is applied to eight Australian and two European cities, and the specific data considerations and parameters chosen are described. Significant disparity is shown in walking access between different destinations within cities, and in walking access between cities. Walking access to recreational opportunities is highest, followed by education and shopping, with very little employment access for most residents. Avenues for expansion and further validation are discussed.

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Section: Open and Reproducible Index Methodologymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Future Researchmentioning

confidence: 96%