Gothamist
A non-profit newsroom, powered by WNYC.
Gothamist
Listen Live
News
NYC is Good for Walkies
By
Jen Chung
Published Dec 5, 2007
Modified Mar 7, 2008
Share
FacebookTwitterRedditEmail
Never miss a story
Email address
By submitting your information, you're agreeing to receive communications from New York Public Radio in accordance with our Terms .
By
Jen Chung
Published Dec 5, 2007
Modified Mar 7, 2008
Share
FacebookTwitterRedditEmail
We rely on your support to make local news available to all
Make your contribution now and help Gothamist thrive in 2026. Donate today
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
A Brookings Institution study reveals that New York is a great place for walking, with 21 out of 21 walkable urban places. But Washington D.C. is the most walkable on a per capita basis while New York is ranked 10th, because New York is measured as the NYC metro area, including NJ, Pennsylvania and Connecticut.
The study's author, Christopher B. Leinberger, admits there are issues with the methodology, namely that walkable places are weighted the same in different areas, even though Midtown Manhattan is 30 times bigger than the DC area's Reston Center. We'd be curious to see how the study would work if only the cities, not including the metro areas, were measured. You can read more about the study here (PDF).
The walkable NYC places mentioned are: (Metropolitan area) Downtown/Wall Street, Midtown, Brooklyn/Atlantic Yards, and Jersey City; (Downtown adjacent) Morningside Heights, Lincoln Square (UWS), Museum Mile/UES, Madison Avenue/UES, SoHo, Chelsea, 34th Street, Union Square, Greenwich Village, Park Slope, Brooklyn Cultural District; and (suburban town center) White Plains, Stamford, Princeton, New Brunswick, Greenwich.
Leinberg also has a book called, The Option of Urbanism: Investing in a New American Dream, which explains that for many years U.S. government has focused on suburban development, driven by the auto and oil industries, which has "fostered the decline of community, contributed to urban decay, increased greenhouse gas emissions, and contributed to the rise in obesity and asthma." He believes that there's a movement towards "walkable urbanism," (as in people flocking towards areas with mass transit) saying, "How the American dream plays out on the ground is changing. Rather than building only 'Leave it to Beaver' neighborhoods, we are building walkable, Seinfeld-like places." Real life as Seinfeld? Sweet fancy Moses!
The list of other U.S. walkable cities below:
1. Washington
2. Boston
3. San Francisco
4. Denver
5. Portland
6. Seattle
7. Chicago
8. Miami
9. Pittsburgh
10. New York
11. San Diego
12. Los Angeles
13. Philadelphia
14. Atlanta
15. Baltimore
16. St. Louis
17. Minneapolis
18. Detroit
19. Columbus
20. Las Vegas
21. Houston
22. San Antonio
23. Kansas City
24. Orlando
25. Dallas
26. Phoenix
27. Sacramento
28. Cincinnati
29. Cleveland
30. Tampa
Tagged
american dream
Atlantic Yards
books
Brookings Institution
brooklyn
Chelsea
city
District
downtown
government
greenwich
greenwich village
heights
jersey city
lincoln square
madison avenue
manhattan
mass transit
media
midtown
midtown manhattan
morningside heights
museum
museum mile
Neighborhoods
New American
new brunswick
new york
news
nj
nyc
park slope
pedestrian
people
seinfeld
soho
union square
urbanism
walking
wall street
washington
Washington D
washington D.C.
washingtondc
White Plains
Jen Chung
Jen Chung is a former WNYC and Gothamist editor.
Read more
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
MORE news
Deer are all over New Jersey roads looking for sex, state officials warn
Mid-October through mid-December is deer mating season, which can be a danger to drivers as the sex-seeking creatures cross roadways throughout the Garden State.
By
Rosemary Misdary
Published Oct 16, 2026 at 4:22 p.m. ET
Man messaged 'I got straight poison' before giving NYC college students fentanyl, feds say
A transcript from an April court hearing sheds new light on what transpired at Fashion Institute of Technology.
By
Samantha Max
News
Man messaged 'I got straight poison' before giving NYC college students fentanyl, feds say
A transcript from an April court hearing sheds new light on what transpired at Fashion Institute of Technology.
By
Samantha Max
Inside the plan to fix the nearly collapsed Pfizer Building, 1/64th of an inch at a time
By
David Brand
School bus carrying autistic students got lost in Brooklyn for 4 hours last year
By
Jessica Gould
NYC’s bridges can last 'forever,' if we take care of them
By
Clayton Guse
Never miss a story
Catch up on the most important headlines with a roundup of essential NYC stories, delivered to your inbox daily.
Sign upEmail address
By submitting your information, you're agreeing to receive communications from New York Public Radio in accordance with our Terms .