The 20-minute dinner. The 20-minute workout. Society is obsessed with getting things done in 20-minutes or less. It seems like an easy amount of time to squeeze in your busy day with time to spare.
So what about the 20-minute neighborhood? It is a core concept described in Portland, Oregon’s 2009 Climate Action Plan where residents can safely complete their daily needs in a 20-minute walk from home. These activities could include grocery and commercial retail shopping, transit connections, as well as access to parks and schools. To support this effort, Portland has encouraged mixed density construction and improving pedestrian and biking road infrastructure. City benefits include less traffic as well as lower environmental impact since total vehicle miles are reduced.
It’s important to point out that the 20-minute neighborhood definition expands even more through biking and use of public transit in less-dense communities. So let’s run with the concept a little bit and apply it to where you live.
Your 20-minute Neighborhood Might Surprise You
We recommend using a map to visualize your 20-minute neighborhood for walking, biking, and public transit. Then consider whether you are able to accomplish all of your daily tasks without a car.
- Open a website (we’ve found the free/demo version of TravelTime works well) that calculates travel distance for 20 minutes walking/biking/public transit from your home address.
- Calculate the travel radius for driving to see if/how much more distance and options it provides.
The results might be surprising. Biking might be equivalent or better than driving depending on traffic and traffic control measures in your city. Or public transit might provide a great option depending on city road infrastructure design.
There are a lot of factors that go into the bike versus drive decision, but this is an important first step to understand travel options and any distance advantages. Previously, we automatically jumped in the car without consciously thinking about if there was another option to do the same task in approximately the same time. Now, we think twice and map it.
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