Vancouver has been awarded the distinction as 2008 “Best Walking City in Canada” by the Canadian Federation of Podiatric Medicine. … Vancouver beat out Fredericton, NB (2nd place) and Nanaimo, BC (3rd place) for the award.
A number of factors contributed to Vancouver being recognized. The City’s natural beauty and extensive parks and greenway systems are world renowned and provide an excellent setting for a wide range of art, history, nature and architectural walks. The establishment of 23 neighborhoods helped create local walkable communities. The City’s infrastructure emphasizes and supports walkability through transportation corridors, parkland acquisition and local greenways.
It is great to see the walkability of Vancouver recognized, especially in downtown and the metro core, which I know has a very high walk mode share. I wonder however, if Vancouver performs as well when one looks at the city as a whole, or the region as a whole? Here in Victoria we take some pride in the walkability of our city, where we have a 24 hour walk mode share of 17% of all trips based on the most recent household travel survey. Looking at 2006 census journey to work numbers, 16% walk to work in the CMA as a whole, with the number rising to 49% of folks living in the City’s central area. Downtown Vancouver’s rate is probably higher than Victoria’s downtown, but I suspect that at the city and CMA levels, Victoria is more of a walking town than Vancouver.
Nanaimo? I don’t trust whatever statistics they are using for this…
Nanaimo? I have never seen anyone walk there really. I guess I am not there during work days though.