Walk Score–the popular website measuring your community’s walkability—rolled out a whole ton of new features today. Most notably, you can now get your “Transit Score,” a glimpse of how well your neighborhood is serviced by public transit.
The results can be surprising. My apartment in Seattle’s Ballard neighborhood boasts a Walk Score of 97—a true “Walker’s Paradise.” But the same address only generates a Transit score of 53. It looks like Ballard residents can get anything they want from their neighborhood, but they can’t get anywhere else.
Another cool feature lets you compare commute times. For me, a daily commute from home to Sightline’s office could be a two-hour walk, a half-hour bike ride, or a 15 minute drive. Plus, it’s got an elevation profile to show the steepness of a bike ride.
Lastly, they’ve brought in some technology from the Center for Neighborhood technology that we’ve written about before. You plug in your income, monthly housing costs, and monthly transportation costs, and it tells you the share of your income that you spend on housing and transportation combined. The idea is to show that it’s often cheaper to live in a walkable neighborhoods than far-flung suburbs.
Enough talking. Go check it out yourself.
