10 Surprisingly Walkable Neighborhoods in the Least Walkable Cities

If your city took it on the chin as a car-centric, stroad-filled, parking-lot-cratered problem child in a CityNerd video, then perhaps this one’s for you. 

There is redemption to be found in ten very walkable areas in ten very un-walkable cities, according to the above video.

You won’t see expensive coastal cities in this one. Instead, our intrepid host paws through places with bottom-dwelling overall Walk Scores (a registered trademark, by the way), which range from a low of zero to a high of 100. 

Hint: Spenard is the most walkable neighborhood in Anchorage, Alaska. I lived there for many years and was even the Community Council president for a while. At $153,000 for an average neighborhood housing unit buy-in, the odds are good. But trust me: the goods are odd. In the best way. (Source: Author.)

You’ll find spots like my hometown of Anchorage, Alaska; Columbus, Ohio; Louisville, Kentucky; Orlando, Florida; and Austin, Texas. These cities have poor overall walkability, but still feature some neighborhoods where one might consider going car-free—the diamonds in the rough, so to speak. 

This CityNerd video starts with Oklahoma City, which has a Walk Score of 34. There aren’t many lower on the 0–100 scale. Its most walkable neighborhood is the Paseo, with an 88. Most candidates have differentials above 50 points, the narrator explains. 

Each gets the classic CityNerd Google Street View tour and the trademark dry humor with a kindly, but snarky, treatment. 

In the countdown, Nashville comes in at number two and has an unenviable walk score of 28, but its East End neighborhood scores 88—a 60 point differential. The narrator: “Cute, walkable streets, check. Some density on 11th, check. Walkable commercial street leading to a commercial node at five points, check. I guess my one hesitation is I can't figure out where the grocery store is, which would be kind of a deal breaker.” 

CityNerd, the YouTube channel, intersects with the Strong Towns approach to development and urbanism, particularly on the subjects of walkability, car dependence, and the Suburban Experiment. Nerd out on videos about induced demand; freeway lids, caps, and decks; and hunting for walkable neighborhoods. Video topics are usually viewer suggested and come out once a week. 

Behind CityNerd is a Portland, Oregon-based transportation/planning project manager with some video production in his background. He took a one-year sabbatical break and found himself producing the YouTube series. He intends to get back to his real job at some point, but in the meantime he’s having too much fun publishing for a fast-growing audience of 23,000-plus subscribers. 

We will be sharing CityNerd posts intermittently, when they connect with Strong Towns themes. Today’s share is a gem from December which has the added feature of identifying over-priced and under-priced walkable neighborhoods in these dynamic, but auto-centrically flawed cities, if you feel like getting out your pro-forma developer pencil.

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