Walkable towns curb obesity, pollution, expert says (Reuters)

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Designing walkable communitiesis a cost-effective way to address the growing epidemic ofobesity in the United States and cut down on harmful caremissions and pollution, a researcher told the American Collegeof Sports Medicine's 12th annual Health and Fitness Summit inLong Beach, California.

The problem, said Jim Sallis from San Diego StateUniversity, is that local zoning laws essentially prevent thedevelopment of walkable communities. "Zoning laws today," hetold Reuters Health, "really enforce the separation of uses;they are designed to move cars as quickly as possible -- whichis dangerous to pedestrians."

Sallis recently took a tour with urban planners in a newdevelopment in San Diego designed to be walkable. "Thedevelopers told me they had to get 25 waivers from zoning lawsto put in the development. All that kind of paperwork costs thedeveloper time and money so it discourages them from buildingwalkable neighborhoods," Sallis said.

He encourages people to "be a voice for walkableneighborhoods and parks in your area and help change localzoning laws."

Sallis would also like to dispel the misconception thatwalkable communities are more expensive to build. They aren't,he said, noting that money spent on building, maintaining andexpanding roadways could be re-allocated to building sidewalksand trails.

Walkable cities "have worked for thousands of years,"Sallis points out. The most walkable cities are on the eastcoast of the U.S. because they are older. "Any city built inthe 1800s is likely to be walkable because everyone who livedthere walked. Cities like Boston, Manhattan, Washington D.C.,inner Baltimore, Savannah, Charleston, are all very walkable,"he noted.

In the west there are fewer walkable cities, except forPortland, which has made a concerted effort to make the citypedestrian-friendly, Sallis said. "Many years ago, Portland setup policies for transportation planning that make pedestrians afirst priority, cyclists second, public transit riders third,and car drivers last. It's now one of the mostactivity-friendly cities in the country."

"The suburbs have really been designed to take away theoption of walking to places; there are no sidewalks, everythingis spread out, and there is really only one way to get aroundand that is by car," according to Sallis.

The good news, he said, is that more and more communitiesare embracing the idea of becoming more activity-friendly byadopting "mixed-use" area laws.