November 20, 2007

What's Your Walk Score?

One of the things I love about my apartment's location in New York is despite the massive population density, for me it's a little like living in a small town in Europe. Almost everything I need is within easy walking distance, and a car is a luxury, not a necessity.

A new website, Walk Score, displays a Google Map of any location, along with walkable amenities (everything from public libraries to restaurants), and assigns a score between 0 (worst) and 100 (perfect). I'm proud to say my address garners a 98. My father, who lives in the hills, scores a poor 19. And my first house, where I walked to school (in the mean streets of West Los Angeles), is almost exactly average. Walk Score admits that the scores are rough approximations, but it worked fine for these three.