Overwieght? Its not your fault...blame city planners!

[Reba 2]

Heavy? Your neighborhood may be to blame. Those built before 1950 help keep you skinnier by encouraging walking.

It could be your neighborhood that's making you fat — or keeping you slender.

A new study found that the year your neighborhood was built may be just as important as diet and exercise for shedding pounds. Those who live in neighborhoods built before 1950 are trimmer than their counterparts who reside in more modern communities, the study reported.

“The older neighborhoods had a reduced level of obesity because they were generally built with the pedestrian in mind and not cars,” said Ken Smith, a co-author of the study and professor in the department of family and consumer studies at the University of Utah. “This means they have trees, sidewalks and offer a pleasant environment in which to walk.”

In the study, which appears in the September issue of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, the researchers found that on average men weighed 10 pounds less if they lived in older, more walkable neighborhoods while women weighed about six pounds less.

The older neighborhoods also tend to have a variety of stores and businesses located within walking distance, so people wind up traveling by foot to do errands, go to local restaurants or other activities, Smith added.

Modern neighborhoods, on the other hand, generally consist of large areas with nothing but housing, an arrangement that hinders walking and forces people to drive more to get around.

Amy Crook, a 34-year-old freelance graphic designer, gained 30 pounds over the course of two years after she moved to a sprawling neighborhood in Bowie, Md., in 2005. “There was nothing to walk to,” said Crook, who noted that she drove everywhere, even to the grocery store two blocks away because there were no sidewalks.

But after she relocated to a more walkable neighborhood in San Leandro, Calif., she dropped the weight without even trying. She didn’t consciously make an effort to increase her exercise levels or modify her diet, she says, but found herself walking more doing daily errands, such as going to the grocery store or bank.

“There’s a whole neighborhood in the area, including banks, restaurants, grocery stores and bookstores,” Crook said. “It’s all within walking distance and it’s easier to get to them by walking than by driving.”

The older the neighborhood, the lower the weight

In the study, Smith’s team used height and weight data from driver’s licenses to calculate the body mass index (BMI) of nearly 454,000 people, ages 25 to 64, living in Salt Lake County, Utah. They then compared BMIs across neighborhoods that had been scored for their walkability, which included whether the area had a diverse array of shops and businesses, sidewalks and lots of intersections.

The researchers found that older neighborhoods were both more walkable and had lower rates of overweight and obese people. For each decade older the neighborhood was, the risk of obesity dropped by about 8 percent in women and 13 percent in men.

Lawrence Frank, a public health and urban planner researcher at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada, said the findings fit with previous showings that sprawl is associated with higher rates of obesity and people who spend more time in cars are more likely to be obese.

“The take away message is that we’ve got to start building communities the way we used to,” said Reid Ewing, a research professor at University of Maryland’s national center for smart growth research and education in College Park. “Prior to World War II, we basically built walkable communities, but for last 60 years we’ve been building sprawl and people don’t have to be physically active as part of their daily lives.”

Fighting obesity with architecture

Building more walkable neighborhoods could be one strategy to fight the rising rates of obesity across the country, Smith said. “It’s very difficult to get people to change lifestyles but maybe we can change their environment to promote healthier outcomes,” he said.

In the meantime, people may want to consider the walkability of neighborhoods when they move, Smith said. (The Web site Walk Score rates the walkability of particular addresses.)

People who live in sprawling neighborhoods can still find ways to get in extra activity, such as playing sports, Ewing said. But walking alone isn’t enough to take off the pounds, diet is also important.

For Crook, moving to a more walkable neighborhood helped her both eat healthier and get in more walking. She stocks up on fresh fruits and veggies during her trips to the local farmer’s market, which prompts her to cook more rather than eating out. She’s still losing weight, she says, and has had to replace all her jeans with smaller sizes.

source

I know I used to walk a lot more when I lived in Toronto, and my hometown of Stouffville. Everything was nearby to walk to, pub, fast-food, donut shop, grocery store, clothing shops...Where I'm at now, not so much. I'm a 10 minute drive to the closest anything. And no sidewalks, so even our nightly walks with the dogs are pretty treacherous. No one pays attention to the 25 mph speed limit in our neighbourhood, they're usually careering about 50 mph around the corners. We're slaves to our cars.

We're looking for a new place to live though, so if anyone knows a walking friendly town in Central or upstate New York, lemme know eh?

[w¡n9Nµ7 §£@¥€r 123]

Ithaca?

[one...two...tree 2,762]

That makes sense. Urban sprawl and rows upon rows of strip malls wouldn't exist without the ease and availability of the automobile.

[Peikko 1,575]

No, what makes sense is that there will be inhabitants of older housing estates who didn't grow up dependant on the car. Simply moving to a pedestrian neighbourhood a pedestrian does not make.

[Trompe le Monde 1,107]

even though I live in a pretty walkable area (esp by LA standards) I have to work a lot harder to not gain weight than I did in London, where at least 30 minutes of walking a day was done by necessity and not choice.

Now I have to purposely go on a walk at lunch or in the evening to get that much.

[Reba 2]

ah, but I already am a pedestrian...I just have nowhere to go where I currently am.

[Peikko 1,575]

There's always somewhere to walk - although I do admit crossing some of the larger streets on foot is a bit of a nightmare.

[Nagishkaw 510]

Forget walking and focus on the elbow, as in bending it.

[Ban Hammer 13,336]

good read

[Nessa 23]

i didn't think so

[Amby 490]

where I live sidewalks don't even exist! I wish I could walk places without walking on the road on through peoples yards. I would walk a lot more if we had sidewalks.

[Peikko 1,575]

I admit I know nothing about places without sidewalks. That would be pretty lame.

[Jenn! 918]

Plenty of sidewalks here and plenty of places within walking distance. But we have cars, so we don't walk. When we lived in a great pedestrian neighborhood and didn't have cars we were much skinnier. Cars are evil.

[Peikko 1,575]

Take resonsibility for yourself girl! The car doesn't 'make you' drive it

[Jenn! 918]

Take resonsibility for yourself girl! The car doesn't 'make you' drive it

You don't know my car. It's like Christine.