For most of us, walking is like flossing our teeth: we know it’s good for us, but we just don’t do it enough. Unlike flossing, making walking a healthy habit isn’t just good for us; it’s good for our whole planet. Compared to driving a car to get around, walking saves energy, prevents pollution, reduces vehicular traffic and associated risks, and builds community by making our streets quieter, cleaner, safer, and friendlier. These benefits earn walking—and other active transportation options like cycling—the second spot on our list of Top Twenty Sustainable Practices.
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Successfully Changing Practices: A Quick Note
Changing habits is hard. It’s easy to imagine yourself walking more, and then after six months realizing you’re still driving just as much as always. A six-step continuous change model can help you take effective action with lasting positive impact:
Start by evaluating your current practices to identify what can and needs to change. Make and share a commitment to improve. Then take aim by setting specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound goals. Develop a plan that describes how you will achieve your goals. Do the work. Measure what matters, so you can evaluate your results and continue the cycle to change successfully.
Two measurements matter most to evaluate your walking practices:
How many kilometers you walk.
How many kilometers you drive or ride in a passenger vehicle.
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Walking 101
Short Trips by Foot
Complete short trips by walking, rather than driving a passenger vehicle, to conserve energy, prevent pollution, reduce risks, and build community.
Pathways
Movement: Move By Muscle
Energy: Conserve Energy
Habitat: Prevent Pollution
Community: Demonstrate Best Practices
Goals
Save the environmental and financial costs of operating a passenger vehicle.
Reduce local vehicular traffic.
Get healthy exercise.
Equipment and Materials
Shoes or boots [Optional]
Hat, coat, gloves. [Optional]
Backpack, shopping bags, or a shopping caddy. [Optional]
Steps
Determine how long and how far you can comfortably walk.
Identify safe and convenient routes and times of day you can walk.
Scout routes by taking walks with a friend or family for fun and exercise. [Optional]
Make a commitment to complete more trips by walking.
Aim to replace a specific number of car trips, such as one per week.
Use a map or app like Google Maps to plan your walking trips. [Optional]
Wear appropriate clothing for the weather.
Bring a backpack, bags, or shopping caddy if you are planning to shop. [Optional]
Walk for trips to shops, school, government offices, etc.
Measurements
How many kilometers you walk.
How many kilometers you travel by personal passenger vehicle.
How much fuel or electricity you buy.
How many times you start engines in passenger vehicles.
Outcomes
Increase the kilometers you walk.
Decrease the kilometers you drive.
Reduce your expenditures for fuel or electricity for your vehicles.
If you drive using an internal combustion engine, reduce engine starts.
Discussion
The practice of taking short trips by foot may be more of a psychological adjustment than a physical one. In North American culture, walking is considered a low-status or leisure activity. Many people drive passenger vehicles for short utilitarian trips out of habit, social convention, or fear for their personal safety.
According to medical authorities, healthy adult humans in most weather conditions can easily walk at a steady pace for two hours, covering seven miles every day. You can determine how long and how far you can comfortably walk from your home by taking scouting walks with a friend or family for fun and exercise.
While healthy people without mobility issues will regularly take long walks of several miles for exercise and socializing, public transit studies in North America find that people prefer not to walk more than 0.25 or 0.5 miles for utilitarian trips.
For this practice, a six-step model for successful change is especially helpful:
Evaluate: consider your opportunities to walk instead of drive.
Commit: tell yourself and your family you will walk more.
Aim: set specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound goals, such as walking the next time you go to the grocery store.
Plan: decide how you will walk.
Do: complete trips by walking.
Measure: how far are you walking, and how far are you driving?
The main environmental benefit of walking is that it reduces vehicular traffic, which conserves energy, prevents pollution, reduces risks of traffic accidents, and builds community by making communities cleaner, quieter, and safer.
Definitions
Active Transportation: walking or cycling
Passenger Vehicle: a machine designed to transport people
Shopping Caddy: a wheeled frame that holds shopping bags
Trip: moving a person or a package from one place to another
Walking: making a trip using your own muscles without the aid of a vehicle
Troubleshooting
Your neighborhood does not have sidewalks
Walk on the left side of the road, facing oncoming traffic.
Drive to a walkable area, then walk from there.
You lack the time to walk
Plan trips for when you have more time.
Build time for walking into your weekly schedule.
Prioritize time for walking in your schedule, removing or rescheduling activities that prevent you from walking.
You don’t want to walk
Find ways to reward yourself for taking a trip on foot.
Listen to podcasts or books on tape while you walk.
You tire quickly when walking
Take shorter walks to start.
Build up your endurance with an exercise plan.
You have too much to carry to walk
Wear a backpack
Use a shopping caddy
Limitations
Lack of infrastructure
Walking may be impossible or unsafe in areas designed exclusively for high-speed vehicular traffic.
Uneven sidewalks may pose a danger if you are unstable on your feet.
Long distance trips
Walking is infeasible for trips longer than seven miles.
Extreme weather
Walking is infeasible during hurricanes and blizzards.
Crime
The personal risks of being harassed or attacked may outweigh the environmental benefits of walking.
Physical limitations
You may be unable to walk.
Carrying capacity
While walking, you can only carry a limited volume and weight.
Opportunities
Practice cycling to
Move faster
Move further with less effort
Carry more
Practice driving electric vehicles to
Complete trips in bad weather
Travel through high-crime areas with less personal risk
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When I was car-free in DC earlier this month, it was amazing to me that I walked consistently 4-5 miles a day. Now back home in Maine I’m paying attention and often matching that. But the functional walks are often less safe or pleasant (on the shoulder of a busy road). And the days I log big miles without noticing are the days I had to shop a big-box store I did not know well.
When I was car-free in DC earlier this month, it was amazing to me that I walked consistently 4-5 miles a day. Now back home in Maine I’m paying attention and often matching that. But the functional walks are often less safe or pleasant (on the shoulder of a busy road). And the days I log big miles without noticing are the days I had to shop a big-box store I did not know well.