Examining the Relationship between Urban Design Qualities and Walking Behavior: Empirical Evidence from Dallas, TX

Shima Hamidi,Somayeh Moazzeni

doi:10.3390/su11102720

Shima Hamidi, Somayeh Moazzeni

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.3390/su11102720

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Abstract

This study examines the relationship between street-level urban design perceptual qualities and walking behavior in the City of Dallas. While the city has the potential to experience growth in pedestrian activities, it exhibits a very low level of walking activity, placing it as one of the least walkable cities in the nation. To assess the impact of urban design qualities on walkability, we collected data on 23 features related to urban design, 11 built environment variables characterized as D variables comprising diversity, density, design, distance to transit, and destination accessibility. The sample included 402 street block faces in Dallas Downtown Improvement District. Accounting for spatial autocorrelation, we found that two urban design qualities, among five, including image-ability—such as a memorable quality of a place, and transparency—as to what degree people can see beyond the street’s edge—significantly influence pedestrian volume in downtown streets. These findings are in agreement with the two previous studies that used the same methodology in different cities (New York City, NYC and Salt Lake City, UT). According to the findings of these three studies, the other urban design qualities including human scale, complexity, as well as enclosure, are not playing a significant role in walkability, despite the theoretical justification and the extensive operationalization efforts. The findings of this study draw policy makers’ attention to creating more appealing and walkable places through the implementation of these urban design qualities.

Highlights

Walking has been proved by previous studies to bring significant social, economic, environmental, and public health benefits to the society [1,2,3]
Our finding shows that in most cases built environmental D variables have the expected sign and are significantly associated with pedestrian counts which is consistent with the literature [15]
This study seeks to investigate the impacts of urban design qualities and street-level built environmental factors on the number of pedestrians in a less walkable urban area

Summary

Introduction

Walking has been proved by previous studies to bring significant social, economic, environmental, and public health benefits to the society [1,2,3]. Walkable metropolitan areas contribute significantly to attracting a higher level of educated people and creative class and retaining high-tech companies and innovative businesses that generate economic development [6]. Despite tremendous research on the benefit of walking, the prevalence of a sedentary life is still high in the U.S Over a period of 30 years, the number of walking commuters in the U.S has declined approximately half from 1980 to 2010 [7]. In 2014, about 48% of the U.S adults did not meet the public health guidelines for 150 minutes of moderate physical activities in a week [8]. Around 30–60% of the population are not involved in physical activities [9]

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