S1: Welcome in San Diego. It's Jade Hindman on today's show. Unemployment is high and so is inflation. What does that mean for San Diego's economic outlook ? This is KPBS Midday Edition connecting our community through conversation. So this idea of a walkable city or a walkable neighborhood is something that's come up a lot in recent years. You've probably had a conversation or two about the places you can walk to from your neighborhood. Which begs the question , Is San Diego walkable ? Well , I'm here live with a panel of experts who've done a lot of work around researching and improving walkability in our region. Bruce Appleyard is a professor of city planning and urban design at San Diego State. Professor Appleyard , welcome.
S2: Thank you so much. It's great to be here.
S1: Glad to have you here. Also with us is Carlisle Dockery , director of planning and community engagement at the nonprofit think tank Circulate San Diego. Carlisle , welcome to you , too. Thanks , Jane.
S3: Good to be here.
S1: Glad to have you also. But not last but not least , I should say I'm here with Israel Hernandez. He's the associate director for advocacy and engagement at AARP San Diego , Israel. It's nice to have you here as well.
S4: Thank you for having me.
S1: Glad to have you here. So , um , there's there's this million dollar question. What does walkability even really mean ? And I know you all have your own perspectives on this. So , Professor Appleyard , I'll start with you.
S2: Well , I'll say we need to think about making walks feasible , um , safe and also enjoyable. So. And walkability can do so much for our community. It's really about our health , our wealth , our community , our environment , and our in our equity , uh , in terms of health. Uh , we're talking about health and safety. We have almost 8000 people killed a year in the US who are pedestrians. Um , but it's also about our public health. It's about getting exercise and lowering chronic disease in our communities by letting people walk. Uh , in terms of wealth. Studies have shown that walkable communities are much more attractive. Were , uh , for employers and jobs and , and job centers and , uh , actually lowering the cost of having to drive is tremendously helpful because between 1970 and 19 and 2010 , the household burden on our budgets grew from 10% to 20%. It's also about community and building social ties. It's also about our environment and lowering our our our air quality , our greenhouse gas emissions , improving our air quality and lowering congestion. And then it's about equity. It's for the old young. It's for people to , uh , people of lower income who. Who are , uh , who require to drive. To walk more than drive. So we need to think about them as well. Mm.
S4: Mm.
S1: It's a lifestyle. Carlisle. Yeah.
S3: Yeah. I think a lot of the work we do at circulate sort of centers around improving mobility choice. So I think we see walkability as a way to ensure that people are able to get around safely , no matter how they choose to get around or how they need to get around. So , uh , echoing a lot of what Bruce said to making sure that we follow some of the tenets of Jeff Spec's core pillars of walkability , right ? The walk should be useful. It should be safe , it should be comfortable , and it should be interesting. So all about making sure people can get to where they need to go safely , however they choose to do so.
S1: And what about for folks who are challenged in that area of being able to walk Israel ? You think a lot about walkability in terms of senior living.
S4: And I know Bruce touched on that also. Um , you know , we're facing a demographic shift in the United States , but also , you know , in San Diego as well. We're looking at a future where there's going to be significantly more people over 60 than under the age of 18. And so for that population , for older adults , for people with disabilities , you know , at AARP , we're really concerned with an initiative we call livable communities , which is , you know , what context do you exist in , in your community ? And we're looking at factors like factors in the built environment , housing , parks and open spaces , ensuring they're accessible , um , accessible housing , transportation , of course. And then in the social environment , things like preventing isolation and ensuring people have access to access to services and supports that they need. So walkability in many ways is kind of a glue that that enables people to access a lot of these things. And again , we're more concerned with the fact that the walk is is safe. It's accessible and we call it age friendly. We refer to our work as a friendly because it is. You know , you'll find that when you make an intersection , for example , more walkable or more safe for an older adult , you're someone with a walker. You're also making it safer for for anyone , for an eight year old parent with a stroller. And so we do a lot of education and some practical application on that front. Yeah.
S1: Yeah. I mean , and again , you know , when we talk about walkability , we're also talking about , you know , people with disabilities or mobility impairments and how they're impacted. How does accessibility come into play there , for example , for people who are visually impaired ? Right.
S4: You know , this comes to life when you do a walk on it. And I know , you know , Bruce and Carlisle here have done many. We've done a number at AARP. It really you know , I think walkability can become a buzzword if you're not thinking about the user experience. Anytime you leave your car , you're subject to walkability. So when we do these Walk audits , it's very illuminating for me as well. And you have a group of seniors , which are the folks many times that we're taking out on these walk audits. We did one recently in Oceanside , and we North River road near Libby Lake , the Libby Lake community in Oceanside. And when we went out to do that walk , audit North River road can operate like a freeway sometimes the speeds that the cars are coming by , you know , we were visually assessing , but really I think it would be safe to say they were coming across 50 or 60mph , well above the speed limit in that area. And so when you're crossing this particular intersection that we were interested in based off community feedback that , listen , we just feel unsafe crossing this , there's a lot of impediments in the road and certain things that we're concerned with. You just see folks struggling to get across the street. And it's a safety concern as well as like an accessibility concern. So yeah , there's mobility impairments , vision impairments. It needs to it needs to work for everyone. Wow.
S1: Wow. Well , Carlile , like Israel said , you do a lot of work in the community talking with people about their concerns and assessing the walkability of their neighborhood. What are some of the most common issues that that crop up ? Yeah.
S3: Great question. Jade. I think just sort of speaking to some of the questions that Israel just answered about visual impairments. A lot of the audits we do are with older adults , but we do them a lot with school groups as well. Some of the things that we're seeing are are easier to fix quickly. A lot of times there's faded crosswalks or crosswalks that are not aligned with the curb ramps. I think that's particularly an issue for folks with visual impairments , because you'll start to notice a lot of the curb ramps are aligned diagonally into the center of the intersection. And so if you're not sure if you're approaching a crosswalk , that will lead you to the other side of the street , or if you're going to be parading yourself directly into the middle of the intersection , that's certainly a safety consideration that needs to be made. We also see a lot of we hear a lot of feedback from people about the length of time that they're given to cross the street. There's certainly a variety of times that are allocated for people. And so some intersections may have a longer amount of time , but a lot of them either will not have a countdown at all or a really short amount of time. And then , as always , I think everyone hears that there's just always a lot going on at intersections. We'll hear a lot about concerns with speeding or concerns with visibility at intersections , particularly as it relates to people who are trying to cross from one direction while people are trying to turn right on red. A lot of times drivers are looking to the left , and when people are trying to cross the street from the right hand side , there can often be incidents that occur in that manner. Yeah.
S1: Yeah. Well , I mean , I tell you , the clock countdown , that's it. Could it's pressure. Sometimes it is pressure , right. Well , Professor Appleyard , it's important to talk about how we got here in the first place. I mean , you've once called San Diego a city of villages and a city of freeways. Talk more about that. And and what that means for walkability in our region.
S2: Certainly , it's important to recognize that we are a city of villages , but they're isolated in part because our our freeways and our the auto dominated culture we deal with. We need to recognize that the the most walkable places in our region are those that were built before zoning occurred in in the 1920s and built up around walking and transit and the streetcars. Places like like Hillcrest and North Park and Little Italy. And we need to recognize how we we need to get back to that place where we're building up retail corridors in conjunction with , with high density housing and , and , and single family homes so that people can actually walk from place to place. And I think there are new things on the horizon , such as SB 79 , which will help build up areas around transit stations that will help us create more nodes of walkability that can be connected by transit.
S1: And we're going to talk about SB 79 a bit later , too. But you know what conditions are needed to make a place walkable , you know. I mean , there there are trees , good sidewalks.
S2: One is about getting people along the street and getting people across the street. So along the street you need to have adequate walkway space , enough at least to have a couple be able to pass another person come the other way. Or actually two couples passing each other. So something between the the size of 6 to 8ft. And then in commercial corridors , we need to think about having 10 to 20 to 15ft and having a healthy buffer that helps buffer people from the traffic. To get across the street , you need to think about breaking up the task and shortening the distance through like curb bulb outs through things like curb bulb outs , median crossing , and preferences for pedestrians to cross the street. But key to all this is the need to have have it be a feasible walk that people really want to go from one place to the other. So you need to have mixed use environments that have people's homes close to their retail environments , and that they'll actually want to walk from place to place. So we need to think about making things feasible , making the walk feasible , making it safe , and also making it enjoyable.
S1: Well , Carlisle is real. Anything to add to that ? No , I think.
S3: I mean , Bruce summed it up really well. I think a lot of times it can be the , the answers that that seem most obvious. Right ? You want to be able to go somewhere interesting , you want to feel safe , you want to feel comfortable , and you want there to be amenities along your route. Like a lot of things that come up when we're talking to people as well. You've touched on is there shade ? There's also oftentimes a lack of places for people to sit. There are times that people want to be spending time outside , and it's actually very hard to do so because along the walk , there's no place for people to sit and rest or to just sit and hang out. Um , quick , build demonstrations and little placemaking activities like parklets can help do a lot in that area too.
S4: Yeah , I would definitely agree with what they both shared. And then I would also add just , you know , this other element when again , when you think about an increasingly large older adult population is , you know , there will be a point where many people are no longer driving and , you know , are no longer able to drive. Um , and so ensuring that we're building communities , retrofitting communities with walkable streets to combat isolation. I know KPBS has reported that currently there's over 100,000 senior orphans , and that's older adults that don't live within close vicinity of support or family. And in recent conversations with some partners , particularly San Diego Seniors Community Foundation and a study they're doing , they found that that number is going to increase , um , to almost 230,000 seniors , orphans in coming years , enough to fill Petco Park two times over. And so the point being , you know how a question we should ask ourselves , how are we ensuring that we're combating isolation of the seniors of today and then the seniors of tomorrow ? And a big part of that is making streets walkable. We hear that a lot at events , listening sessions. Wow , I'm so glad this was near my apartment. This is the first time I've gone out in a couple of weeks , and that sounds dramatic , but that really is what we're hearing from a lot of seniors from around the county.
S1: Yeah , that's such an important point. Um , a question for all of you. Because , you know , driving culture is a big part of San Diego. In fact , we asked Reddit at our San Diegan what they thought about walkability. And there was a big consensus that San Diego is very car dependent. One of the top rated comments read , you know , it's walkable from wherever you park your car. So what do you make of San Diegans independence of of cars or dependence ? Not independence , but dependence of cars rather. Carlisle.
S3: Yeah , I think I'll I'll take a moment to plug. There's actually this comes at a really exciting time. This question , Miracle Walks , a nationwide organization , is leading the campaign , which is actually next week. National Week Without Driving starts September 29th , runs for a week. So it's a good opportunity for anybody who is convinced that San Diego is car centric. I agree there is a it is definitely built around cars. I think also that it can be a lot more walkable than some people realize. So National Week without driving is a good opportunity to if you have the ability to test out , even if it's a couple of days , not a couple of weeks or not a full week , just give yourself the chance to try walking your commute , or taking the bus , or taking the bike and see what it actually might be like in your neighborhood , or what other folks who might live in your neighborhood are going through if they don't have access to a car , if they're getting around in another way. So I think that it's a it's a cool challenge I try to participate in every year , and it's just a good way to learn a little bit more about how your neighbors are getting around. Yeah.
S1: Yeah. Professor.
S2: Yes , I'd say we have a very exceptional , uh , transit system throughout the , throughout our region. And we should we should try to take advantage of that as much as possible. We do have a lot of , you know , we're very freeway rich and everything's very freeway close. And pretty much every car you encounter on the , on the surface streets has probably been just on the freeway traveling at 60 , 70 , 80 miles an hour. So it's a it's a thing we need to deal with. We need to make sure our streets are safe for our for our walking. But we could really leverage our transit system and build up around the transit systems more through through such measures as SB 79 and also in our own community plan updates. And for example , we could probably do a better job in in the Claremont Community Plan update , where we allow for more development around the transit stations itself. And then we create a culture where people can take transit and walk in our different villages throughout the region.
S1: But why is San Diego such a freeway rich , car dependent area in this beautiful part of the country where it seems obvious that you would want to make walkable neighborhoods in the planning process.
S2: And then the federal government basically put through the Interstate Defense Highway Act of 1956 said to communities , if you spend $0.10 , we'll let you spend whole dollar. We'll we'll fund these freeways to the tune of 90% of the cost. So people overbuilt freeways because of that. And so now this is the the system we have. And we can manage it by making places more walkable , by managing parking so that it kind of it puts the true cost of driving on people's , on people so that they won't drive as much. And those are the things we can do.
S1:
S3: You always have to follow the money. I think it has been , uh , definitely something that we're it's a whole we're sort of trying to work ourselves out of the freeways. You can you can sort of tell. I think I had this conversation with Juliana when we were getting ready for this , but a lot of times a neighborhood can feel really walkable until you reach the freeway onramp. And so I think often about a walk we did with the serving seniors folks in downtown San Diego. There's an off ramp from the five freeway around Second and Cedar in that area , and there's actually no stoppage for the vehicles coming off of the freeway. But it's an area that's frequented by a lot of people who live in the apartments in that area. The senior center is very close by , and there's warning signs on the freeway offramp that says , hey , yield to pedestrians. They might be crossing the street at the bottom of your off ramp. But that alone does not make for a safer , walkable environment.
S1:
S4: I mean , for myself , my car battery , car battery recently died a couple of weeks ago. And , you know , as someone that lightly uses public transportation , but , you know , if you have to be multiple places in one day , it I think it's a cultural thing to an extent , you know , and perhaps in California , but definitely in San Diego , that we are a spread out county. And if you want to do multiple things in one day , sometimes , you know , you feel that the most efficient thing to use is your car. When my car battery died , it was kind of like a wake up call. I had many places to be. Lyft is a knee jerk reaction many times , but we're also talking with a lot of seniors that are saying we can't afford that. AARP is currently doing a study specific to San Diego where we're looking at what are some of the what is the posture of older adults as it relates to how you know their relationship with transportation , their cars ? And we heard that the number one thing that people anticipate when they're no longer able to drive is that someone will drive for them. So it points back to the car again. And this idea that we need to help increase education around other options as well.
S1: Still to come. Our conversation continues on the other side of this break. KPBS Midday Edition is back in a bit. Thanks for sticking with us. This is KPBS midday edition. I'm Jade Hindman. We're talking about walkability in San Diego and what's being done to address it at a local level. We're here with Bruce Appleyard , professor of city planning and urban design at San Diego State , along with Carlisle Dockery , director of planning and community engagement at Circulate San Diego , and Israel Hernandez , associate director for advocacy and engagement at AARP San Diego. From a policy standpoint , what is San Diego doing to make our city more walkable and even the county for that matter ? I imagine it is a tough needle to thread Israel.
S4: Uh , one bright star I think I could definitely point to is , uh , county aging and independent services. You know , they do a lot of great education around complete streets. In fact , they created a Complete Streets toolkit for older adults. And , you know , going back to an earlier question you had about , like this , this culture , this car centric culture , I think the education is a really key component in making more folks aware about what walk , what walkability is , you know , from that , from that standpoint , I think that's really positive. Um , something else that you could point to would definitely be the City of San Diego's Complete Streets policies , I understand , is the first complete streets policy in our region. And while , you know , I think many folks want to see those policies get strengthened and built upon , it is a good framework because , you know , the reality is , as Carlisle mentioned , you know , follow the money until until many of these changes become policy and people start to look at areas they plan to build or they're retrofitting and then implement complete streets policies , that idea that you're going to make that area work for everyone. Particularly for the pedestrian. Um , I think that'll really be the shot in the arm to change to making more tangible , built environment changes.
S1: And tell me a little bit more about Complete Streets.
S4: And if you look at certain parts around the county , it becomes more evident why we need complete streets. If you look at a bus stop that does not have a sidewalk , let's say , and those do exist in certain parts of the county , that's a pretty clear indicator there that if there were complete streets , planning principles in place , or a complete streets policy that would have been addressed when that area was built. So AAP for example , it's new to a lot of jurisdictions. So we have at the national level , like a model complete streets policy language that through our work with cities , counties , we really encourage them to use as a framework to adopt these policies.
S1: Carlisle , what are you seeing the city and county do ? Yeah , I think one of.
S3: The the initiatives that comes to mind for us is Vision Zero. Sandag just recently released their Vision Zero Action Plan , and it obviously , for anyone who's not familiar , Vision Zero is the goal of eliminating any traffic related fatalities , whether that's pedestrians , bicyclists , vehicle users themselves. And so , um , we're we're hopeful to see a lot of really positive changes come out of that report. Uh , in that same vein , circulate and families for Safe Streets San Diego do a lot of advocacy around something that we call the Fatal 15. So that's identifying the 15 most fatal intersections for pedestrians and bicyclists in City of San Diego , and then advocating to the City of San Diego to make actionable changes in the near term to those intersections. I think sort of the point that Israel made earlier about improvements that you make for older adults in terms of walkability , benefit everyone. The same can be said for improvements related to Vision Zero and traffic calming , right ? Things that can be done to slow down traffic and make things safer for pedestrians and bicyclists. Also make it safer for people who are driving and who need to drive. And I think that that part sometimes can get overlooked in Vision Zero. A lot of the people who are Bruce quoted some of the fatality numbers earlier. A lot of the fatalities we see in San Diego are people who are pedestrians and bicyclists , and they're certainly overrepresented in those numbers , but also the greatest number of people who are dying in traffic fatalities each year in San Diego County are people who are either driving or passengers of vehicles. And so Vision Zero improvements , traffic calming improvements do a great deal to improve safety for those folks as well.
S1: Well , Professor Appleyard , let's talk about density here , because KPBS reported that San Diego is building a lot of new homes in some of its most walkable neighborhoods. Um , tell me a bit about that. Um , you know , because , like , in fact , California lawmakers recently cleared the way for Senate Bill 79 , as you mentioned earlier. Mhm. Um , so tell me a bit about that. Yeah.
S2: Yeah. It's very important density and and of course also a mixture of uses uh , for places to walk to are really a key component to this as well. And um with density usually you have lower , uh , parking availability. So people then um , have options to go into transit , bicycle and walk. And we need to keep supporting that because our region we have , you know , great weather. And by building up density , especially around transit nodes , we can we can help create this walkable future for our community where we're where people can leave their homes. Walk. Walk down to the on the main street mixed use commercial corridor. Do their shopping. Take care of business. Get on the trolley. Get on. Get on a bus. Get to their destination and walk there as well. So these are things that are all really important. And as I mentioned , one of the biggest problems that that undercut our walkability was our zoning that separated uses and , and took away the proximity between one place to the other. And so if we can build more densely in mixed use areas around transit stations , we can help overcome this freeway dependent , auto dominant society we have now.
S1: What do you all think people aren't always thinking about when we talk about walkability is real.
S4: I'll go back to Aging , you know. You know , while sometimes when I mentioned walkability to folks again , you know , they'll , you know , again , it could be a buzzword if you're not really thinking about it in the context of how how you were walking , you know , the moment you get out of your car , wherever you arrive , you are subject to walkability , to the safety of the street. So what I would ask people , it's one of those things , and I think I heard this on a circulate walk out at like once you see it , you can't unsee it. And I think that's very true. Like , you know , I can't go to an intersection now without noticing , you know , that older adult really had to hustle to get through the last three seconds of it. So what I would ask folks , is just when you go out to walk , just consider these factors. Does it feel safe ? You know , and then if you think about all those things and then if you want to take it a step further , you know , organize your own walk audit. We have a great walk audit toolkit a number of organizations do on our Livable Communities website. And it's a great , you know , start to finish toolkit to kind of learn not just how to conduct a walk audit or the things to consider , but what do you do with that information , you know.
S1:
S4: What AARP ? Um , if you if you were to just Google , you know , I don't have the link to it. That's horrible. But if you were to just Google AARP Livable Communities library , all of our toolkits will be there. And , um , yeah , we have a number of them , but we have a transit audit toolkit that we also developed with Circulate San Diego. Um , walkability is absolutely applicable there. But yeah , I would encourage folks to dig a little deeper than if you want to take it even further , find out if your neighborhood association is is conducting walk audits , and if not , perhaps look to organize something like that with friends or other community members.
S1:
S3: My friends who walk with me now try mostly to tune me out as I'm pointing out all of the the things that are wrong with the intersection. I also try and look at the positive things right , noticing where they're what the city is doing well. But I think one of the frames I've been trying to do more recently is to just as I'm walking through an intersection , really like center myself in how much space there is. Um , the the roadway is the public right of way. Right. And so theoretically , this is like public space that we're all utilizing. We're all , um , paying for with our tax dollars. It's it's interesting to see how small you feel in some of these intersections , how wide they might be , count how many lanes you're crossing. Sometimes you can sort of lose track of like and parking lanes count to right. How much how much space am I having to travel and how much of the roadway is dedicated to different modes of transportation ? How wide is the bike lane relevant to a lane of traffic ? How wide is the sidewalk relevant to those things ? And also listen to the sounds right ? I recently went to New York City , went to one of their open street events. I never realized how quiet Manhattan could be. I have so many videos on my phone of like , people walking and biking in the streets , and it's essentially silent. You can hear people's chains on their bicycles moving , you can hear birds chirping. And I think a lot of times we've gotten so used to like a sort of constant rush of background noise. And cities aren't loud by default. It's just really interesting to try and and frame yourself in that context , no matter where you are.
S1: That's a good point you raised there. I mean , because really , who wants to walk alongside a bunch of traffic and car exhaust ? You know , it just doesn't make an area conducive to that.
S2: It's been auto an auto oriented culture. Designing our roads for so long. And noise is a major intrusion. What noise is very is , is very harmful and disturbing to everyone. So I think one of the things I would also say is we need to think about the health , wellness and and joy of walking and how much happiness it could actually give people , and giving people independent mobility , especially children and the elderly. So I think these are things that we really need to think about as we go forward , that it's much more than just just health or safety. It's also about wellness and community building and the ability for us to to meet neighbors and to get to know our community and to understand our community more and and from our equity perspective , to make sure that people from all ranges of our society have access to a healthy , joyful walk.
S1: Well , what you said there brings me to something else that a commenter on Reddit said. They said walkability is extremely important to me , since it helps me engage with neighbors and take pride in my neighborhood. I also believe that the more walkable an area is , the healthier its inhabitants are , and it helps reduce localized pollution. Talk a bit more about some of those , the health impacts and also in particular mental health impacts. Professor. Absolutely.
S2: Absolutely. No. We we show that people are less stressed if they walk. They have they have lower chances of getting chronic diseases. And I just go back to a study my father did over 50 years ago. Looking at the connections across the streets with different levels of traffic and with lower levels of traffic , there's strong social connection and cohesion across the street. And there's there's important community building like that can happen. And in my study with children looking at those who walked or were driven to school , the children who were who walked or bicycle had a much stronger sense of community , a much stronger sense of place , a much stronger connection with their with their environment. So health and wellness , joy and and a sense of community and better social cohesion is all really important and something that we can get from better for from a more walkable region.
S1: Yeah , well , to end this on a fun note , let's do a quick fire round here. Favorite place to walk to or spot to walk ? Israel.
S4: Uh , it's a classic , but Balboa Park , it's just from from end to end. Uh , it's a beautiful walk and good for the mind.
S3: Very true. Carlyle.
S1: Carlyle.
S3: Yeah , for me , I , I live in Sherman Heights area , so I like to bike down the Bayshore Bikeway. They just redid the park down by the wildlife refuge in Chula Vista. There's a lot of really great waterfront trails down there. And so I like to walk from there to , um , there's a couple of other parks along the waterfront and back , but it's lots of natural landscapes and birds and flowers and waterfront.
S1: Very nice , Professor Appleyard.
S2: Well , we live in Middletown , and my wife and I like to take walks down to Little Italy and have a nice , leisurely dinner or walk back and also go up to Hillcrest and North Park. And again , we really enjoy those connections we have with these walkable communities in our neighborhoods. Excellent.
S1: Excellent. Well , I've been speaking with Bruce Appleyard , professor of city planning and urban design at San Diego State. Also , Carlisle Dockery , director of planning and community engagement at Circulate San Diego , and Israel Hernandez , associate director for advocacy and engagement at AARP San Diego. Thank you all so very much.
S3: Thank you. Jade.
S2: Thank you Jade.
S1: That's our show for today. I'm your host , Jade Hindman. Thanks for tuning in to Midday Edition. Be sure to have a great day on purpose , everyone.
