I read a “study” that compared European cities by walkability

The least walkable cities were Oslo, Marseille, Hamburg, Lisbon, Birmingham, Turin, Bordeaux, Prague, and Toulouse

That’s a very strange set of cities to place in your top ten, esp Oslo and Lisbon.

Well, the study looked at walking only to the top five attractions in the city proper, rather than just the city centre…

So for Oslo this included Vigeland Park, which is nearly an hour on foot from the city centre (but ~20 min by train), for Hamburg this included the Port of Hamburg… Which… What? Why would you walk all that way??? That’s over an hour by foot!!! And for Birmingham included Cadbury World, which is 90+ min on foot from the city centre, but only 20 min by train?

So this is not “how walkable a city is”, but “how close it’s main tourist attractions are to each other if you forget that buses, trains, and trams exist”

https://radicalstorage.com/travel/most-walkable-cities/

Okay the methodology is actually EVEN WORSE than I thought.

They ranked cities by how quickly you can walk between these attractions if you were to do a walking tour. For Birmingham, this takes over three hours. Which… Yes of course it would.

Villa Park is in the inner north, Cadbury World is in the far south, and the other three are in the city core… What tourist is choosing to do a walking tour between all of these places?? This is not an itinerary that makes sense. I am sure it is the same for the other “worst” cities on this list

Did this website not know how tourism works or anything?

@yassie_j Good post but I also need to emphasise and shill Vigelandsparken because that place is awesome and you need to go there if you don’t go there you failed your Oslo trip I don’t make the rules that’s just how it is.

@yassie_j

Walkability, what's that? - Every American Ever.

Ok. I lie. It's not that bad. We have some walkability within some US cities, but not really from one city to another city.

@yassie_j remind me about this on monday, i do want to bring this up to my prof, because this is interesting

Oslo takes 20 hours by this measure… Ignoring the fact that Oslo has an extensive public transport network and nobody is going to expect you to walk 20 hours around a city and it’s environs because that’s what public transport is there for???

@yassie_j also “how quickly” isn’t even a good measure here, I’d rather have to walk an hour through lovely streets than 20 minutes past a highway

Now I want to know what the hell is this whole thing for? Why did this article get published? Why is a storage company saying this? Is there some kind of storage related reason why it’s assessing walkability really badly?

@orangelantern you mean that it’s not normal for a tourist to walk all the way to the Port of Hamburg, as this guide suggests?????

@syn also, your reply just reminded me: the walk from the city centre to Cadbury World involves a landscaped canal path, with pleasant views, ducks to watch, and no vehicular traffic to bother you

So if you were to walk it, it would actually be a very pleasant walk! So in that sense, that actually makes it a very walkable way to get to an attraction, even if it is long and completely bonkers to do

@gen @yassie_j I can schedule a post

@yassie_j Also actually people just walk a lot in Oslo it’s kinda chill. When I am there I notice I walk a TON, way more than where I live now. It’s just a very pleasant place to be for me.

@syn yeah, if you need to never visit any of these places, this guide is clearly for you

@ielenia @yassie_j please do :3

@gen @yassie_j done

@yassie_j based on the logo, it might be more of a luggage company than like, storing things at home or in a computer.

which means it's more of a travel website.

and the research methodology is just ass because they want to put out slop content.

@orangelantern I just realised that both you and @hannah live in Hamburg!!!

@orangelantern @hannah that means if I visit Hamburger, I can tick two birds with one… Er… Well, I won’t use a stone

@ielenia @yassie_j thank you cutie <3

@yassie_j Sleeper fish! Beep!

We will take over the world… one fish at a time!

And hello to that particular Fischkopp @orangelantern !

@yassie_j @orangelantern Hannah will use a plushie!

@hannah @orangelantern you two should follow each other, you will get along well

You are both besties

@yassie_j @orangelantern Oh no…. Yaseen is matchmaking creatures again!

@hannah @orangelantern you should both do this walking tour where you walk over an hour to the Port for no reason

@yassie_j @orangelantern Honestly…. there are worse things to do…

@hannah @orangelantern I’m not shipping!!! I’m saying you two should be friends!! Mr Lantern is aloof and sarcastic, Hannah is bubbly and eccentric, it is like the ideal buddy comedy!!! That’s my real aim!

@orangelantern @hannah do it

Do it now

For me

Yaseen, your friend

@orangelantern @hannah you have that cool older brother vibe

@yassie_j I find Birmingham decently walkable, I wish they had a tram though.
Just walking through some areas is quite scary

Going back to this, they say that Oslo is ranked the worst city because you have to take a ferry and thus this increases walk time.

Oslo is an archipelago. You will need to take a ferry. Unless you are Jesus Christ, you are going to find it extremely troublesome to walk to some destinations. That is why ferries exist.

@Baa there is a tram! It runs through the city centre.

@yassie_j that’s crazy I never even noticed, I’ll check it out next time

@yassie_j plus the real value is in how easily residents can get around. and that obviously includes public transportation

@Baa TBF, until ~2015 it was just light rail connection between the edge of the city centre and the towns and villages through to Wolverhampton. They extended it into the city centre like 2016 in little pieces and then subsequently extended it to cut it right through the city centre to the southwest section of the city centre

There’s a new stub through the city centre that will open this year sometime, but HS2 is delaying any further expansion work because their unbuilt station is blocking the construction of the east extension

@charlotte @yassie_j Because most of the time, most of the people getting around cities are the residents.
And residents don’t tend to care too much about visiting signature attractions.

@yassie_j @Baa in before the unbuilt station gets canned entirely