One major benefit of living with less stuff is the ability to move more freely and Linda and I have gravitated toward places conducive to community and walkability. Consequently, more than half of the places we have called home during our marriage have been in walkable locales (usually near water of some type), including Savannah, GA; Mount Dora and Celebration, FL; Nantucket, MA; Franklin, TN; and now Lexington, VA.
Lexington is the second town in which we’ve actually lived on Main Street, with the other being Nantucket, and we even live across the street from an outfit called Walkabout Outfitters, which supplies gear for area hikers of the nearby Appalachian Trail. One of the appeals of living downtown, especially in a small town, is what I call the walkability factor. A key benefit listed on real estate sites to entice people toward available properties, a high “walk score” typically means a premium sales price.
A good definition of walkability is: “The extent to which the built environment is friendly to the presence of people living, shopping, visiting, enjoying, or spending time in an area.” Author Jeff Speck writes in Walkable City: How Downtown Can Save America, One Step at a Time: “The General Theory of Walkability explains how, to be favored, a walk has to satisfy four main conditions: it must be useful, safe, comfortable, and interesting. Each of these qualities is essential and none alone is sufficient.”
Henry David Thoreau stated, “I spend the forenoon in my chamber writing or arranging my papers and in the afternoon I walk forth into the fields and woods” (and neighboring Concord). As for me, I usually walk to a nearby café or the local library to read and research in the morning and do most of my writing afterward at my home office overlooking Main Street. The above picture is of the lane leading to the weekly farmer’s market across the street, another perk of living in a walkable community.
At least once a day, usually during our lunch break, Linda and I try to walk around the block together or, as time permits, across town to stroll the beautiful campus of Washington & Lee University. For more musings about community and walkability, feel free to check out “Loving Village Life” and “Of Church Bells and Community.” And do yourself a favor by going for a walk in your own community, wherever you call home.