Access Across America: Walking 2014 Methodology

Abstract

Accessibility is the ease of reaching valued destinations. It can be measured for various transportation modes, to different types of destinations, and at different times of day. There are a variety of ways to define accessibility, but the number of destinations reachable within a given travel time is the most comprehensible and transparent, as well as the most directly comparable across cities. This report describes the data and methodology used in the separate publication, Access Across America: Walking 2014 (http://hdl.handle.net/11299/176566). That report estimates the accessibility to jobs by walking in the 50 largest (by population) metropolitan areas in the United States. Walking mode-share for commute trips nationally is around 2.8%, and 5.0% within large cities in the United States. Rankings are determined by a weighted average of accessibility, giving a higher weight to closer jobs. Jobs reachable within ten minutes are weighted most heavily, and jobs are given decreasing weight as travel time increases up to 60 minutes.