muddart is really, really tired, but can't sleep
Actually I was surprised that this goal already existed, since I haven’t seen too much talk out there about “walking communities”. So, I thought I’d define what I mean when I say “walking community”.
To me a walking community is a community where most of one’s daily life can be accomplished by walking. You work from a home office or the office is within walking distance. There is a grocery within walking distance, and shops and places to hang out… and so you can walk just about everywhere, and other people in the community do the same, and so you see people on the streets.
Why do I want to live in a walking community? I’m not sure, except I have had tastes of it, and it feels good. It feels good to have places nearby that have “regulars” (and where you are one of those “regulars”) and where you get to know the coffee shop owner, the grocer, the lunch counter waitress, etc. I’m kind of tired of living in what feels like an anonymous and autonomous society, where we go from house to garage to car to work to cube to car to garage to house, and thus can go a whole day and never really have human interaction (except to talk about the numbers on some report).
The last 5-6 years I have been working my way into a job that doesn’t require me to do that. I telecommute for my job, and often spend a good part of my day in a coffee shop working from there. Not quite in a walking community yet, but maybe halfway, and trying to move more and more in that direction.
