Why Walking and Walkability? The Latest Info to Make the Case This session will provide an overview of the latest data and studies highlighting the multiple benefits of walking, including in the areas of health, the environment, economic vibrancy and quality of life. Presenters: Presenter: Kate Kraft America Walks Co-Presenter: Scott Bricker America Walks Co-Presenter: Joan Dorn Centers for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC) Co-Presenter: Paul Heberling Office of Safety, Energy, and Environment, Office of the Secretary US DOT Co-Presenter: Thomas Schmid Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

2. Making Walkability Happen: Practice wisdom, derived principles and ideas for action
M. Katherine Kraft, Ph.D.
September 9, 2014

3. Walkability Principles
-Guidelines for practice
-Expedite outcomes
-Integrate our work

4. Purpose: Use practice wisdom to identify actions that are essential for developing walkability
Interviews with seasoned practitioners with recognized successes (“tribal elders”)
-Reflect on successful projects and identify factors that made them successful
-Identify key characteristics of walkable communities
Interviewed to date
Purpose and Methods
Dan Burden
Victor Dover
Mark Fenton
Pete Lagerway
Lauren Marchetti
John Moffat
John Norquist
Jeff Olson
Lynn Richards
Jennifer Toole
Gary Toth
Charlie Zegeer

5. Developmental Phases to create walkability
Getting Starting and Engaging Community
Assessment
Planning and Priorities
Policies, Zoning and Design Guidelines
Institutionalization, Incentives and Market-based

6. Effective Approaches and Tactics
Getting Started
Listen and Vision
Develop Champion and Vision

7. Defining Walkability
The extent to which the built and social environment is safe, convenient, and attractive to people living, shopping, enjoying or spending time in an area on foot.
“We want to build a place that people love.”
“The places we love were not created as a solution to a traffic problem, they were created to bring joy to humanity.”

8. What we learned – general observations
Optimistic
“The wind is behind our sails, our task is to figure out how to use it.”
Top down, decide, announce and defend no longer works
“..most successful community change agents are those that listen and inspire.”

9. What we learned – ideas and actions
Process: How you work with communities
Project: Necessary features/elements
Policies: How we sustain them

10. How you work with communities: starts with a mind set
“Community members are the true experts of where they live.”

11. How you work with communities?
Listen and Frame
Inclusive Process
Vision and Values
Leadership Matters
No One Size Fits All

12. Listen and Frame
Listen to the community and respect the local community traditions and norms
“Make no assumption about what the answer should be.”
“Understand the real community concerns and frame the issue in a way that addresses these concerns.”
“Get a good grounding in the social context of the place.”

13. An Inclusive Process is Vital
•“A multi-disciplinary team is useful, do not stay in one sector, broaden thinking.”

14. Vision and Values
Talk about the community vision and values – describe the place in 50 years and 100 years into the future
“One should not do anything in a place if it doesn’t advance the community vision.”
“Best advice is focus on community building and placemaking, then walkability and livability will follow.”

15. Leadership Matters
Empower a champion, Find a Vision Keeper
“Make it somebody’s job.”
“I think it really comes down to leadership. Leadership in two areas, one that represents political will, and a project champion – someone that feels strongly. Having that one person who lives, breathes this; is more important than political will. “

16. No One Size Fits All
No single policy solution – No silver bullet
“ Each community has its own traditions, its own culture, its coming from a place already, ….Acknowledge that every single community is going to have a slightly different starting point..respect that and build off of that instead of trying to one size fits all. “

17. Projects
“Walkability does not appear to happen organically. The machinery of development and re- development will not take you there without a conscious effort.”

18. Gateway Projects
•Use temporary and lighter, quicker, cheaper projects to show what is possible.
•“We have a mismatch between how people really want to live and the rules and regulations that guide development and land use.”

19. “Slow the the traffic”
“Make the streets beautiful”
“Streets are places, return to their multiple purposes.”
“It doesn’t really matter what the question is, the answer is a good street network and bringing the buildings to the street.”

20. Policies and Incentives
•Change the incentive structure so that we move away from auto dependency
•The rules and the money have to steer the community toward healthier designs

21. In the words of our elders…
“It is not technical….we need the real essence of a social movement, to begin to function like a movement and support one another. Hundreds of advocacy groups pushing own little niche, try to create a broader movement.”