“Walkability” - What It Means for Home Owners - and Buyers - in Alexandria

The benefit of living in a walkable neighborhood has gone to a whole new level with the Web site Walk Score, www.walkscore.com. Launched in the summer of 2007 by a group of tech geeks in Seattle, the site got over 1,000,000 hits in just four weeks from visitors who wanted to know a property’s Walk Score!

The site uses Google Maps and business listings to compute a Walk Score for any address in the United States. It bases the assigned points on the distance to local amenities and then averages the score. Matt Lerner, one of the co-founders, says that since the site launched they have received lots of emails from users saying that walkability is the number one priority they focus on when buying a house.

That should come as no surprise to residents of Old Town Alexandria and Del Ray in particular, who have always boasted about walking to their favorite restaurant, coffee shop, bank, or farmer’s market as an everyday occcurence.

Seattle based Lerner noted that while some of the benefits were obvious, like walking is good exercise and helps to reduce environmental pollution, walkability also supports local businesses and local culture.

While the MLS doesn’t offer a Walk Score yet, it’s a great way to start thinking about your own property.

Our home in Del Ray got an 80. What about yours?

Thanks for stopping by,

Michael