20 Children's Books Featuring Walkable Neighborhoods and Car-Free Transportation

True confession: I LOVE book lists. Love. I know I'm not the only mom of young kids to spend hours with multiple windows open on the computer, searching back and forth from book list blogs to the library, reserving as I go. One child suddenly loves princesses? There's a list for that. STEM books? Definitely lots for those! Math picture books? Don't mind if I do! Chapter books for kids who love Magic Tree House but whose parents can't read aloud another one? Oh yes.

I have my favorite sources for book lists, including the Read-Aloud Revival and What Do We Do All Day, but I have yet to find a list of children's books specifically featuring walkable neighborhoods and kids getting around by walking, biking, and using transit. Besides the fact that walkable neighborhoods are just lovely to look at, I imagine that kids feel empowered by seeing characters getting around independently, without having to depend on an adult to drive them around.

So here is my first attempt at compiling some great children's books that feature walkable neighborhoods and car-free transportation. Most of these are picture books, which reflects my own children's young ages, but I have a few chapter books at the end. Please share your favorites in the comments, as I hope to make this a series!



1. When We Go Walking by Cari Best. A girl and her family walk in all four seasons while she collects things along the way.



2. This is Our House by Hyewon Yum. A girl tells the story of generations of her family living in the same house.



3. I'm My Own Dog by David Ezra Stein. A dog walks himself and throws his own stick, and he soon finds a pet of his own.



4. Lola at the Library by Anna McQuinn. A girl walks with her mother to the library every week. Bonus points for highlighting libraries!



5. Wait by Antoinette Portis. A small boy walking with his mother finds many reasons to slow down.



6. The Most Magnificent Thing by Ashley Spires. A girl works on making The Most Magnificent Thing on the sidewalk in front of her house.



7. Last Stop on Market Street by Matt de la Peña. A boy and his grandmother ride the bus across town, while she points out the everyday beauty that is often overlooked. You have to love a no-nonsense Nana who says, "Boy, what do we need a car for?"



8. Metropolitan Cow by Tim Egan. A calf befriends a young pig who lives next door, and the two friends explore their walkable neighborhood together.



9. The Pink Refrigerator by Tim Egan. Dodsworth discovers a mysterious pink refrigerator, runs a charming secondhand shop, and rides a cargo tricycle.



10. Bear on a Bike by Stella Blackstone. This is a fun transportation book for toddlers and young kids.



11. Bear about Town by Stella Blackstone. The same bear walks around his town, one errand for each day of the week.



12. Playground Day! by Jennifer Merz. A girl walks to the playground with her wagon full of stuffed animals.





13. My Bike by Byron Barton. A man bikes to work at a surprising place. Like all Byron Barton, this is a fun, simple read for toddlers.



14. Water in the Park by Emily Jenkins. A beautiful day in the life of a city park.



15. Adèle & Simon by Barbara McClintock. Adèle picks up her little brother, Simon, at school, and they enjoy the attractions of Parisian streets while Simon proceeds to lose all of his things. A reminder of how vibrant and appealing city streets can be, and a fun search-and-find for kids so inclined.



16. Spot, the Cat by Henry Cole. A wordless book that follows a cat through his day in a city.



17. The Honeybee Man by Lela Nargi. A man in Brooklyn raises bees on his rooftop. This is a lovely peek into both neighborhood life and urban homesteading.



18. The Poppleton series by Cynthia Rylant. I want to live in Poppleton's charming small town! This is a beginning reader book that is mercifully fun to read aloud (not all beginning books are).



19. Half Magic is a classic fantasy novel that features a whole family of children getting around on their adventures by walking and using transit (not surprising, given the time period).



20. This is the first in the Betsy-Tacy series, another older classic. Betsy and Tacy enjoy simple, realistic adventures while exploring their small town.

What are your favorite children's books that feature kids walking, biking, using transit, or just living in beautiful, walkable communities? 

The #1 Way to Keep Children from Running into the Street

There seems to be an epidemic of children running into the street. I'm not basing this off of any statistics, but judging from many "discipline" discussions around the Internet and in parenting books and magazines, young children, poorly disciplined, want nothing more than to run into the street.

Anytime a parent disagrees with another parent's discipline methods, or feels those methods are too "soft," the immediate question posed is almost always, "But, how will you teach your children not to run into the street???" Personally, I happen to agree with Sara over at Happiness is Here that children too young to understand that streets can be dangerous should not be playing near automobile-containing streets without supervision in the first place.

But as this seems to be such a pressing problem in America today, I thought I should throw my two cents in as well. So here goes... the number 1, almost-fail-proof method for preventing children from running into the street is...

Walk with your children. Walk with them a lot.

Walk with them when they're babies, in carriers or wraps and then strollers. Walk with them when they're starting to toddle by themselves. Walk with them when they're walking confidently, and then riding their bikes.

Walk to the park. Walk to the store. Walk to the library. Walk anywhere you possibly can do so safely, with your children. Make sure to include a variety of types of streets and intersections. Make it a part of your daily life, if possible.

If you walk with your children often, as a way of life, they will learn very early and very quickly what roads are about. They will see cars, driving fast (it is very difficult to gauge just how fast cars are going if you only ever see them from another car). They will see you, walking on the sidewalk, and looking both ways before crossing the street, and waiting at stop lights. They will begin to understand what you are doing, and why, and they will do so too with very little explanation on your part.

And you know what? Children who understand the street because they walk there, a lot, will understand why their grown-ups don't want them running into the street. They will understand on a visceral, intuitive level that they need to be careful.

By the time my son was a young toddler, maybe 15 months old, he seemed to understand about traffic lights and walk signals. He had almost never seen them from a car because we lived in an extremely walkable neighborhood, but he stopped with us at the corner and waited for the light, without being told. From the time he learned to walk, he had been walking with us, not just fake walks to the end of the block, but real walks to get somewhere. When he wasn't walking on his own down the sidewalk, he was in a stroller going somewhere, on a daily basis. It was never necessary to say to him, "Don't step onto the black," or other seemingly-arbitrary explanations I hear adults giving to toddlers to try to keep them out of the street.

My youngest is now 16 months old, and she occasionally slips out the door and down the driveway, with one of us trailing close behind to scoop her up. But I have noticed that she never aims straight for the street. She gets to the bottom of the driveway and then veers either left or right, onto the sidewalk, because she knows that we never walk right out into the street. Children who walk a lot (or are walked a lot) will imitate the behavior of the adults who walk with them.

I am of course not suggesting that you release your toddlers to play by the street unsupervised, but it is comforting to know that children value their own safety almost as much as we do. They will avoid danger once they truly understand that something is dangerous.

Should it be the case that streets in neighborhoods containing humans are dangerous to those humans? No, of course not, and there was a time when children played in the street without care or worry. It was once considered the business of the drivers, horseback riders, motorists, and bicyclists to avoid the children, not the other way around. But until that is the case again, let's stop worrying about how to teach our children to stay out of the street, and show them.

Coming Back

It has been a while since I've written here, and I'd like to say it's because I've been so busy on other projects. That is partly true: I took on the rather consuming project of growing and birthing the third child in our young family, a project that has involved much thinking and planning about what our car-free lifestyle will look like with three kids (more thoughts to come on that subject).

Since late summer last year, we have also been traveling off and on, travels that have reinforced our notions about what we value in a city. On top of this, there has been a seemingly endless parade of local walkability and transit issues taking up my head space and mental (and sometimes physical) energy. Some have turned out well, some have been annoyingly contentious in this sometimes backward community, and some are still in process and make me want to plug my ears and sing "la la la la la."  

It can be frustrating to live in a place with beautiful natural surroundings, wonderful potential, and a committed cohort of involved citizens striving to develop that potential, and yet to see change happening so slowly. When it comes to walking, biking, and transit development, nothing here can be taken for granted as it might in a more progressive city. Every project or levy to improve transportation choices has to be explained, debated, and justified in painfully simplistic terms. The community at large, as well as a few very powerful business interests, often don't understand (or refuse to concede) that walkability, bikeability, and centralized, reliable transit are good for business, public safety, and the community. 

Car is king here. All too frequently, the attitude one hears is, "We don't have congestion here, and everyone is happy driving cars. Why would we possibly need new transit/sidewalks/bike infrastructure?" Here, transit is for poor people, sidewalks are for the downtown business core only (and should be obstructed as little as possible by actual people), and bicycles are for trail riding only (after you drive your bike to said trail, obviously). 

This is by no means an unusual state of affairs for a mid-sized American city, and Spokane is certainly not the worst. It passed complete streets legislation in 2012, and many encouraging projects to make the city more human-friendly have been completed in recent years. The city is undoubtedly improving as a place to get around without a private vehicle. But for a family with young kids deciding where to settle down for the long term, I have to admit that the overall culture is discouraging. 

I am the first to say that one shouldn't complain about something one is unwilling to work to change. Especially where walkability is concerned, I believe in making the most of your situation, even when it is not ideal, and advocating to improve it. But if I may be honest, I would prefer not to spend these years of my life - while my children are young and require so much of my energy already - in a place where living out our values has been made so very difficult, when we know that there are other places further along the development path. Until my children are old enough to walk and bike the required distances on their own, it would be great to live someplace where those distances are shorter and safer. And I definitely don't want to succumb to a culture where strapping children into car seats is considered the normal way to get them from place to place on a daily basis. To me, a place where children cannot walk and bike safely everywhere they need to go is not a "great place to raise a family," a claim one often hears about Spokane.

Whew. But. Enough venting. In the meantime, here we are. We are fortunate to be able to live in one of the most walkable neighborhoods in town, and we are enjoying ourselves as spring is in the air. I want to continue documenting our adventures with our now three small children, as well as some new thoughts I've had on education, creative expression, and simple life at home with kids. 

Why Buses Aren't Best

Like most mid-sized American cities, Spokane once had a lovely streetcar system. The city's small blocks and some remaining tracks are a testament to how Spokanites once got around, from "streetcar suburbs" to downtown for work and play. And like most American streetcar systems, Spokane's was converted to motorized buses with a little help from National City Lines (a front for General Motors, Standard Oil, and Firestone Tire).

Now, again like many American cities, Spokane's only public transit consists of buses, which is not a terrible thing, after all. Buses may get a bad rap, but they are less expensive than building rail options, and they do the job. A city building up a transit system may have an easier time affording buses, and buses are flexible - routes can be opened and closed very quickly.

But as you may have guessed, buses aren't my favorite, especially when I'm traveling with kids. Even when buses manage to be clean, convenient, and safe, like the bus routes in our neighborhood, they miss the mark on many features that can make public transit attractive and efficient. And as I'll mention again and again, public transit that is unattractive and inefficient will fall into a cycle of serving only people who have no other choice but to ride the bus, and bus service will suffer from lack of demand (and most likely a seedy reputation).

Buses get caught in traffic, just like cars
Streetcars, trolleys, light rail, subways, and some electric buses and rapid transit buses have the benefit of a dedicated lane or rail, so they are not competing with cars for road space. Commuters in their cars may see a trolley in the next lane zipping by during morning rush hour and think, "Hmm, that looks nice." The result is efficient transit and a built-in motivator for people to give it a try. However, most city buses share lanes with cars and so get stuck in the same traffic jams, leading to unreliable service.

This can especially cause problems during large events, when buses get caught in lines of cars and fall behind. The people smart enough to avoid traffic and parking during events may be punished by arriving late, or, in even sadder cases, being rerouted. My family had the most ridiculous experience last year of taking the bus to the county fair, only to find when we reached our "destination" that the bus had been rerouted around the fairgrounds, specifically because the fair was in session. With our two kids, we had to cross a 4-lane road, a railroad track, and the gargantuan parking lot set aside for all those cars.

Buses feel impermanent
You just never know with a bus. Schedules change, routes change, today there might be a detour because of construction, tomorrow a cancellation because of weather, special events... you just never know. Of course, it's easier than ever with smartphones to keep up on what the bus service is doing, but that's unlikely to attract new bus riders. And there is the always-scary experience of riding a new route for the first time and not knowing where to get off the bus. Do I pull the cord early and risk walking a mile that way, or do I pull it late and risk walking a mile this way? So many choices.

With rail, if you see a rail, chances are very good that a train will come by eventually. If your destination is near one of the train stops, chances are very good that the train will stop there for you, whether or not you pull a cord. That permanence is very reassuring to new transit users and is more likely to attract the diversity and number of riders you need to keep a quality system up and running (and improving).

Buses are above ground level, making strollers, carts, and wheelchairs difficult
When I took the Metro in DC, traveling with a child in a stroller was no big deal: I took the elevator down or up to the platform, rolled my stroller onto the train, and sat comfortably in a seat with my stroller in front of me. If I had bags or purchases in the stroller, they stayed put for the whole ride, making for seamless transitions.

In contrast, on buses in all the cities I've lived in, there has been a policy that strollers must be folded up, their passengers and contents removed and carried by hand, no matter how empty the bus is. I cannot even begin to describe how inconvenient this is, particularly for parents or caregivers traveling with more than one child. I start out well enough from my home: preschooler on foot, baby in stroller, diaper bag, purse, or whatever tucked in the stroller's storage compartment. By the time I get on the bus, I look like a bag lady: bags on one or both shoulders, baby in arms or in a carrier (which helps a wee bit but not much), stroller in the "free" hand, all while trying to corral a 3-year-old with the mere sound of my voice. I often get the comment, "You have your hands full!" which is figuratively true in so many senses, but need not be literally true.

Unfortunately, the stroller problem is compounded in a city that already has limited transit coverage. If I can't get all the way to my destination and have to walk, say, a mile or more at the end of my transit ride, it's even more important that I have a stroller with me to carry a tired kid the rest of the way. What this means for the city as a whole is that parents with young kids will simply not ride transit, unless they have no other choice. The SUV culture prevails.

Buses are rarely sexy
In Happy City, Charles Montgomery talks about Bogotá Mayor Peñalosa's strategies for making public transit sexy: rapid transit with dedicated lanes and new, clean stations, and shiny, lipstick-red buses. People who had to ride the buses felt better about it, and the new buses attracted new riders. It's such a silly thing, but aesthetics do matter to people. A bus that looks a few decades behind in design is unlikely to attract the ridership of a sleek, modern fleet, whether rapid transit bus or rail.

Good cities need good transit
I am all about walkability, but a key part of living a walking/biking lifestyle is being able to get to those out-of-the-way places when you need to, without owning a car just for rare cases. I prefer walking, but I believe in transit.

There is nothing more convenient than being able to hop on transit, travel to the zoo or museum or concert or wherever, and hop off, not worrying about traffic or finding and paying for parking. What could be better than going out for the night with friends and not having to have a designated driver? Families riding transit with kids don't have to worry about car seats, and they can sit next to their kids and have real conversations, rather than having to concentrate on driving.

Public transit can make or break the image of a city, whether for residents, tourists, or potential residents and visitors hoping to open businesses. The best transit can make a city feel connected, safe, and forward-thinking. And modern transit options, especially non-bus modes like trolley and light rail, are the most likely to attract a wide range of people to the city and the transit system.

One Year of A Walking Mama

One year ago this month, I started this blog as a way to work through my thoughts and ideas about designing cities for people, not cars. Okay, let's be honest - I started writing to vent my frustration about living in exurban exile. Much has changed for the better over this year, and I'm glad to still be writing, occasionally about smart growth and occasionally about simple, slow parenting.

I am very thankful to be living in a walkable, livable neighborhood yet again, and I am thankful for any and all of you who have stuck with me this year (or joined us recently).

Things are still changing as my youngest is now old enough for the bike trailer, my eldest is outgrowing the iBert seat, and we're moving into our first summer in our new neighborhood. I'm looking forward to sharing all the car-free fun we'll be having around here in the coming months.

Book Review: Happy City by Charles Montgomery

I was lucky enough to bump into this delightful read in the new non-fiction section of the library. Although I've read more than my fair share of smart growth books, it has been a while, so I thought I would give Happy City a chance. And I was so glad I did - I feel very warmly about this inspiring and, well, happy book. It is not overly sentimental or unduly optimistic, but it gives some entertaining and solid evidence for how good design can make us happier, and it has plenty of anecdotal evidence that people can change enough to make his recommendations work. It was also just a lot of good fun (for example, did you know that you are more likely to give to charity when getting off an ascending escalator rather than a descending one?).

I am the first to say that if you care about anything - health, economics, social justice, beauty, family, the environment - you should care about smart growth, and Charles Montgomery really brings every one of these issues to bear on good urban design. Here are a few themes that really struck me as fresh ideas.

Freedom

"...we all live in systems that shape our travel behavior. And most of us live in systems that give us almost no choice in how to live or get around. Americans have it worst. Even though a majority of Americans now tell pollsters that they would like to live in walkable communities...these places are in massive undersupply." (p. 194)

Trying to convince people that cutting car dependency gives them more freedom is a bizarrely tough sell, considering that "dependency" is right there in the name. But Montgomery explains it very plainly. When cities are built around cars (as in the urban sprawl that has been the major design strategy for the past fifty years or so), well, you pretty much have one option if you want to go somewhere or do anything: get in your car. Whether you are someone who likes to drive or hates to drive, you still have one option: get in your car. Maybe you could walk to that gas station that is a mile or two away, but you can be sure that the walk will be long, ugly, unpleasant, and likely unsafe.

On the other hand, when cities are built around a variety of modes of travel - walking, biking, private cars, public transit  - everyone has more choices. If you like to drive, you can still drive. But if you don't, you have the freedom to travel in a different way. And this freedom is much more fulfilling than the "freedom" cars offer of being able to go wherever you want, whenever you want. That how we get places has a big effect on our happiness.

Also related to freedom, Montgomery devotes a chapter to zoning codes. Zzzzzzzzzz... I can hear you thinking. But zoning codes that mandate sprawl (for example, by requiring new businesses to provide a ridiculously large number of parking spaces, or requiring streets to be a certain minimum width) are behind most of the dispersal that makes cities unwalkable, ugly, and unsafe. In other words, sprawl did not happen as a result of free agents making free choices in a free market. In many cases, zoning codes limited (and still limit!) our urban design choices. 

Equality 

"By any objective assessment, the happy mayor's efforts to make the poor feel more equal actually made them more equal." (p. 238)

"Most of the noise, air pollution, danger, and perceived crowding in modern cities occurs because we have configured urban spaces to facilitate high-speed travel in private automobiles. We have traded conviviality for the convenience of those who wish to experience streets as briefly as possible." (p. 170) 

The example of Bogotá, Colombia, keeps coming up in Happy City, and it is a good lesson about what designing urban spaces for equality can look like and accomplish. Mayor Peñalosa's initiatives included investing heavily in "sexy" rapid public transportation, so that those who had to use buses felt better about it and got where they were going faster, and so that those who might not otherwise use public transit started doing so. He also created streets that reversed the typical layout of poor streets in developing countries: rather than paving the street to make drivers' (and thus a wealthy minority's) lives easier, he paved the middle of the street for the exclusive use of pedestrians and bicycles, leaving cars to drive on the unpaved sides of the road.

The issue of equality often comes up in urban development discussions: where should limited tax and development dollars be focused? Is it more important for sidewalks and bus routes to be developed in poor neighborhoods because "they are the ones who use them" (an actual argument I've heard advanced in my town)? What of gentrification? Good for poor neighborhoods, bad, indifferent?

While Montgomery admits that social policy is outside the scope of his book, he does devote a chapter to asking "Who are our cities for?" Even if you don't really care about your neighbor, Montgomery argues that societies that feel more equal are better for everyone, rich and poor alike. It turns out that people don't like feeling that they have less worth than other people, and in countries with high income disparity (like our own), this very feeling of inequality leads to all kinds of social ills.

Relationships

"Cities that care about livability have got to start paying attention to the psychological effect that traffic has on the experience of public space." (p. 167)

All the happiness research I have read comes down to pretty much one thing: relationships. Once you are satisfactorily fed, clothed, and sheltered, the quality of your relationships will make or break your happiness. Fair enough. But how can smart urban design improve our relationships?

First of all, Montgomery addresses the "super commute" and all the other effects of urban sprawl that have us spending hours per week in our cars (often alone). Car commuting, especially over long distances, can not only keep us away from our families before and after work; it creates stress that makes us less likely to enjoy that time with our family when we get it.

Second, our most important relationships with family and close friends are not the only ones that contribute to our happiness. Montgomery cites research that the minor relationships in our lives - with our neighbors, the mailman, that guy who works in his garden on the next block - affect our happiness almost as much. The reason for this is that they are human connections without some of the stress of our closest relationships, and they create a tapestry of humanity around us. Not surprisingly, this makes us happier. Urban design that puts us into contact with our neighbors regularly can build up this important resource.

Finally, as noted in the quote above, the noise, danger, and just ugliness created by fast cars and car-centric development hurt conviviality. Montgomery cites very telling research about how traffic and noise affect the way we interact and treat one another. In one example, residents on a low-traffic street in San Francisco reported having many more connections with their neighbors than a high-traffic street, even though the streets were the same in every other regard. In my own city, I thought of the examples of one-way streets and the freeway cutting through the heart of downtown: the noise of fast cars just keeps people away (or in their own cars).

The great thing about Happy City is that, despite laying out all the obstacles to the happy, green, flourishing, ideal city, Montgomery concludes with optimism. He shares stories of people changing their lives for the better at the individual level, the neighborhood level, and the city level, proving that in spite of unfriendly zoning, decades of dispersal, and some naysayers who deny that sprawl makes our lives worse, there is something each of us can do. 

Of Skywalks and Self-Denial

Ah, skywalks. The classic example of reasonable, seemingly logical urban development thinking with ugly unforeseen consequences.  Spokane, Cincinnati, Detroit, and Minneapolis all fell prey to the skywalk craze of the 1960s and 1970s, and Spokane's is the second largest skywalk network in the country.

The idea behind skywalks was not without merit: "Hey, our city has cold winters. It also has businesses that want to attract customers, customers who could just as easily drive to a climate-controlled suburban mall instead. Humans don't like to be cold. Therefore, they will be more likely to shop in our city center if they don't have to walk outside. As a plus, skywalks look spacey and futuristic."

Unfortunately, all this weather-protected walking and shopping took people off the sidewalks, lured customers away from street-level businesses, and left cities looking lifeless and, well, kind of '70s.

Last week, I was downtown around lunchtime with my kids, on a cold but dry, not unpleasant January day. We were in the downtown core, where there are many office buildings and restaurants, and presumably many able-bodied office workers who enjoy eating food at midday. I was therefore shocked by the number of business people or other professionals I saw on the sidewalk - that is to say, not a soul. We were practically alone. The few people out could, I suppose, be called "loiterers," for lack of a more precise classification: people who are absolutely deserving of respect, dignity, and support, but whose presence you don't want exclusively characterizing your streetscape, if your goal is to attract tourists, shoppers, workers, and businesses.

We continued with our errands, and as we were preparing to leave the library to catch the bus home, I realized that though separated by several blocks, the library and the bus plaza are completely connected by skywalk. I usually avoid skywalks as a rule, but in my defense, it was cold, I hadn't really packed my full arsenal of warm layers as we were mostly traveling via bus, and besides, my 3-year-old pointed to the skywalk and said, "Let's go that way," so away we went.

Yes, unsurprisingly, it was warm. And yes, we did pass some indoor shops we wouldn't have otherwise seen. But I was surprised to find there all of the professionals missing from the sidewalks. And not just professionals, but other parents with kids, shoppers, possibly tourists - in short, everyone who was so conspicuously absent from the streetscape below.

Cities need a healthy mix of people on the sidewalks. People doing nothing more extravagant than walking and looking around promote a feeling of safety (and actual safety), a sense of community and interest, and boost the city's image. With a majority of people hidden upstairs in climate-controlled tubes, the city feels the way I found it: cold, dead, creepy, desolate. On the other hand, even in the coldest winters, people bundled up and hurrying from shop to shop or from work to restaurant on the sidewalks can make the same city feel inviting, vibrant, active, and safe.

Because most people are not willingly going to avoid the skywalks simply to do their part for the good of the city, the best thing to be done is to tear the suckers down. Cities like Cincinnati and Baltimore are doing precisely that. While I don't expect Spokane to do anything so bold anytime soon, my own skywalk days are over. As much as I hate cold (and I do, particularly in February), I plan to deal with the cold and do my part, outside, where I belong. The streetscape needs us.
 

Car-Free in the Winter

It is not winter yet. Oh, no, no, no. Not yet. But I've had a couple of questions lately from friends and relatives about our transportation plans for the inevitable cold months ahead (which can be long and snowy here in the Inland Northwest).

First of all, we have done five years' worth of car-free winters in DC, and winter is usually no picnic there, either. On the other hand, the walkability and dependable public transit options in the DC area do make for a different situation. We also spent three of our DC winters without kids, and the remaining two winters with only one kid, so we are indeed dealing with a different matter this time around.

Based on our experience now and doing this lifestyle with kids, I'm fairly convinced that any healthy person without children can live well without owning a car almost anywhere. Active transportation like walking and biking warms you up, so staying warm is genuinely not a problem if you dress appropriately. And snow can be stared down quite effectively with a good pair of boots (or a not-great pair of sneakers, which is what I've been using up until now). Having kids does complicate the winter issue insofar as young kids can't walk or bike as far as adults (or not at all, in the case of our 9-month-old), so they can't warm themselves up.

That being said, we will likely continue doing what we're doing now, just with more layers! I especially love wool and silk under- and over-layers, whether knitted by Mama or purchased from any number of accommodating retailers. Although wool under-layers can be expensive, they don't need to be washed often, so I can get away with just buying one of a particular item of clothing and airing it out to fresh between wearings. And, really, I could outfit my kids from head to toe in organic wool and silk and still come out ahead compared to owning a car!

I would love to ride my bike all winter, and I am going to try to do this as much as possible, especially on kid-free trips. I don't know how my tires will do on snow and ice, and I probably wouldn't want to ride next to cars in icy or dark conditions with kids. Cars around here will not be looking out for bikes past October. In the daytime, though, if it's just cold, our bike trailer is fully enclosed and blocks the wind, so it is surprisingly warm inside.

The same bike trailer turns into our double stroller, so again, if we adults can walk somewhere, the kids should be cozy inside with coats and a blanket. Thick snow might be a problem for this stroller, but a light snowfall won't deter the 20" inflatable wheels on this baby. Sidewalks around here tend to get shoveled pretty well (as opposed to the streets), so I'm really not worried about even deeper snows. And, really, who would drive a car in over two or three feet of snow, anyway? On truly terrible winter days, we will do what all of us should be doing: taking a snow day and sticking close to home while making do with what we have, or sending one of us stouthearted adults to the store alone if necessary.

As final options, there is almost always the bus for longer trips, or getting a ride from a neighbor in dire circumstances. I don't like doing this much, but neighbors should be neighborly, and I wouldn't deny someone the joy of being neighborly if we truly needed something and couldn't get to it.

Finally, there are two things I like to keep in mind about winter carlessness: first, walkability is much more about proximity of amenities and quality of infrastructure than it is about climate (look at Finland, Norway, the Netherlands, and even parts of Canada). By no means am I comparing Spokane to Finland, but it helps to remember that many other humans live in equally bad or worse winter conditions without cars, and they do just fine.

And second, driving a car in the winter brings its own discomforts, inconveniences (I recall one particularly irksome episode, waiting in line at Costco for snow tires as a favor to a relative after the first snowfall last year), and probably more dangers. Winter just has a way of toughening us all up.  





 

Moving to be Car-Free (Again)

As you have probably gathered, we have been living against our will as exiles in suburbia for the last several months.  I started this blog partly in response to our situation, to remind myself of my values in an environment that seems designed to undermine them.  That sounds overly dramatic, and I know that there are people who manage to live simple, non-materialistic, non-car-centric lives in the suburbs. But really, trying to live car-light in the postwar suburbs is like trying to lose weight living next door to a McDonald's: possible, but unnecessarily difficult.

For this reason, I'm thrilled that our liberation from suburbia is now imminent!  Our situation has become secure enough in our new city that we will be able to move into a more permanent home in August. We have already located said charming bungalow, so I wanted to expound a bit on our thought processes in choosing a home that supports a car-free life with little ones.

The Fabric of Our Lives

I do love cotton. But in this case, I'm referring to the geographic fabric of the places we choose to live and be. 

For myself, I feel that my life's fabric is a cohesive whole when I know I can walk to anyplace that I need on a daily or weekly basis. That is our general guiding principle for choosing a place to live. That doesn't necessarily mean that I will walk to all of these places; I may bike, take public transit, or carpool, depending on my needs, time, energy, and the weather, but I like to know that nothing I need on a regular basis requires me to run across a freeway, walk more than a block or two on those hideous 6-lane tributes to postwar engineering (you know the ones), or generally take my life in my hands. Even if Trader Joe's is 5 miles away, I like to know that I could walk there safely if the mood were to strike. 

WalkScore.com is a very useful tool to determine whether the neighborhood you're considering is generally walkable. It has features that allow you to plot your commute by time and mode of transport (a 30-minute walk, for example, or a 10-minute bus ride).  It does have some limitations, however, so it is necessary to check into the specifics yourself.  For example, an outlying area covered in strip malls, big box stores, and wide streets will receive a high walk score, though no one in her right mind would like to live there.  I know WalkScore is working on a new Street Smart feature to mitigate this problem, but it is not operational yet.

With those general ideas in mind, here were our specific guidelines for choosing a walkable home.

#1: Walking distance (or one easy bus ride) to working spouse's work.

In How to Live Well Without Owning a Car, author Chris Balish argues that if you can get to work reliably and regularly without your own car, then you can live without one altogether. Work is the one place you need to get to on time, on a daily basis. Everything else is negotiable. For us, walking distance is under 2 miles or so, a 30- to 40-minute walk. 

The house we settled on is even closer to my husband's work than we planned, more like a 20-25 minute walk. Keep in mind that 20 minutes of walking is not like 20 minutes of driving: it is 20 minutes door to door. No looking for parking, no waiting in traffic, just 20 minutes of fresh air and exercise. Forgot your wallet? No U-turns or driving around the block necessary: just stop, turn 180 degrees, and continue walking down the sidewalk until you get back home to pick up whatever you left behind.

This is actually the first time we will have the luxury of living within walking distance to work. Walking Daddy is looking forward to leaving behind his two-bus commute and having a bit more freedom. I will also be able to walk to meet him with the kids for lunch or after work for evening activities downtown.  For lazy days, running-late days, or bad weather days, there is also a bus that can take him to work in 5 minutes.

#2: Ten-minute walk to at least one real grocery store.   

Not a convenience store or just a farmers' market. This may or may not be where we do our large weekly grocery run, but it needs to be a place where we can pick up bread at 10 o'clock at night, or eggs for a last-minute birthday cake.  We then like to have other grocery stores or farmers' markets within a 30-minute walk or an easy bus ride.

#3: Ten- to fifteen-minute walk to at least one park with a playground. Multiple parks preferred.

With young kids, a park within walking distance is a necessity and sanity-saver. We prefer to have more than one park to choose from so the walk is interesting and varied for us parents as well.

#4: One library within a comfortable walk or a very easy bus ride.

See my last post on libraries: the library is a weekly necessity for us.  In our new home, we will actually have three libraries within a 2-mile walk, including the main library branch.

#5: A neighborhood where we want to take walks.  

Walking is the major leisure activity for the adults in our family, so some elements we look for are sidewalks, interesting homes, mature trees, businesses for window shopping, and multiple parks.

#6: Other amenities desirable but not necessary for daily/weekly life: A hardware store, coffee shops, clothing and household stores like Target (we do much of this kind of shopping online anyway), churches, bookstores, restaurants, theaters, community centers, doctor's offices, or natural parenting stores (I only mention these because our city just got one - Bella Cova).

Note that our list of priorities reflects our current life stage and needs... if we didn't have kids (or if we liked bars), then bars, clubs, and restaurants would figure higher on the list. With very young kids, we're not too concerned about schools yet, though we will have one right across the street, which will be nice for the playground and comparatively slow traffic.

 But doesn't that cost more?

To paraphrase the bookseller in You've Got Mail, yes, housing in a community like I'm describing is worth more. There are ways to cut the extra expense, such as choosing a smaller dwelling, picking an apartment over a house, or living in an up-and-coming neighborhood. We are fortunate to live in a city where the cost of housing is low enough to begin with that we don't have to compromise any of our house wants (size, style, number of bedrooms and bathrooms, yard, etc.) to live in a location we love, BUT we would be willing to sacrifice any of those things for location in a heartbeat if we had to. When we lived in the DC area, we did sacrifice quite a few things we wanted in our home itself in order to be able to afford to live in a walkable neighborhood.

While our housing expenses may be higher than they would be in an outlying suburb, our overall cost of living is much lower. By living in a walkable community, we save hundreds per month on car ownership (about $8000 per year according to Balish), not to mention gym membership. We're healthier and happier being part of the fabric of a community, rather than having the different parts of our lives divided up into pieces. Is all of this worth either higher housing costs or less square footage?  There is no doubt in my mind.

  

  

Making Our Cities Family-Friendly

Usually, when I hear the term "family-friendly," it is referring to parents' ability to protect their children from seeing or hearing about sex, violence, foul language, rock n' roll, or nipples. For a city to be labelled "family-friendly," it must also have good schools, some parks and/or museums, a low crime rate, and a small visible homeless population.  All worthy goals, to be sure.

But as you've probably guessed, I am not referring to any of these admirable qualities when I talk about making our cities family-friendly. Instead, I'm thinking about ways we can make it easier, safer, and more pleasant for people of all ages and life stages to get around without a car. This used to be the norm in all American towns and cities because, um, people didn't have cars, or only had one family car. The postwar boom years changed all that, and many of our cities are just getting around to correcting those mistakes, as we begin to see where this automobile-centric development has gotten us.

Though you'll notice that I am unequivocally in favor of car-free and car-light living as much as possible, this post is primarily aimed at exposing the follies of policy-level decisions about urban and suburban development that do not promote walkability (what I would call livability).

But why should we frame this as a family issue?  I'll look at it from two angles, the health and development of children, and the health of family finances. Both arguments apply equally well to singles, couples without kids, families with pets, the elderly... you know, humans in general.

Cars (our own and other people's) are not good for our kids 

This is a shockingly traitorous thing to say in a country that loves its "family" cars, the bigger, the better.  My husband and I got married having never owned cars, and no one seemed to mind (especially as we were starving grad students in a very walkable city).  But once we were expecting our first baby, the not-so-subtle hints started rolling in... "How will you get to the hospital?"  "How will you take the baby to the doctor?"  "What will you do in the winter?"  With this highly ingrained notion in our culture that the smallest children require 3500-pound vehicles to get around, it might seem crazy to argue that kids might be better off without so much car travel in their daily lives, but here goes.

Car accidents are the most obvious manifestation of the fact that cars are bad for us. Accidents continue to be among the leading causes of death for all age groups, and the number one cause of death for children. To be fair, something has to be the leading cause of death, and I bet we would all prefer for it to be accidents than, say, pneumonia. All the same, any other cause would have a ribbon color and charity walk assigned to it by now. Unfortunately, the individual choice for families to go car-light or car-free does not necessarily remedy this situation, as pedestrians and cyclists are not protected from being hit by cars.  In the name of safety, many cities continue to widen roads, which only leads motorists to drive more recklessly.  Ironic.

Besides accidents, cars also contribute more than their fair share to pollution, spewing exhaust and emissions into the air that children should really have the right to breathe without concern. This affects children in cars, as well as children walking and bicycling (though kids walking on busy roads during rush hour will get the worst of it). 

And of course, our kids are becoming obese in higher numbers than ever before.  High fructose corn syrup doesn't help, soda doesn't help, TV and video games don't help, but for many kids, a sedentary lifestyle stems from their real inability to get anywhere safely without depending on their parents' (or eventually their own) cars. Kids walk and bike to school more rarely than previous generations did, and then they often need to be driven around to after-school activities by taxi moms (no fun for the moms, either).

Constant car travel also isn't great for parental interaction with kids.  The ungenerous laws of physics dictate that our youngest, most vulnerable children should be as far away from us as possible in a motor vehicle in order to keep them safe. Our littlest babies face the back of the car, missing out on the face-to-face time generally considered beneficial to human interaction and development.  When we do turn around to address squabbling siblings or a lost pacifier, we are putting our kids in danger.  Compare this to walking with a baby in a carrier or stroller, or walking side-by-side with an older child (on a safe and beautiful sidewalk) - every moment is an opportunity for conversation, learning, and relationship-building.    

The necessity of owning a car (or two) is not good for family finances

Anything that leads us to waste money is not family-friendly. Spending more unnecessarily means working more and/or saving less, which means less time with our family, more debt, later retirement, and more stress due to financial difficulties. And cars are undoubtedly a huge financial drain, from purchasing (including financing and depreciation), to use and maintenance (insurance, gas, repairs, upgrades...). 

They are certainly a useful waste of money, in their place, but unfortunately, many of our cities are built in such a way as to mandate their use. This means that families need to spend more money (on the order of $8000 a year per vehicle), work more, and sometimes sacrifice the luxury of having an at-home parent, just to keep their two or more cars.

A good chunk of a second income earner's salary often goes just to pay for that second car, which in turn is necessary to get to work and drop kids at school or daycare. Even in the case of a stay-at-home parent, a second car may still be necessary because schools, groceries, libraries, doctor's appointments, and parks are not within walking distance. How many extra hours of work do we put in, just for the privilege of getting from place to place!

What do we do?

Obviously, cars are useful and have their place.  I like to think of them like fast food: convenient, sometimes practical, fun on occasion (like road trips), but definitely not something you want to use every day of your life.

We need to look at what we can do on a city and community level, as the title of this post suggests. At the very least, our cities should be safe and welcoming for all kinds of families and individuals, particularly those who cannot drive cars and end up being the most vulnerable (i.e. children, the elderly, the disabled, and the poor). By developing cities (and suburbs, and exurbs) where car ownership is an implicit prerequisite, we condemn these groups of people to a life of dependency on motorists.

On an individual level, we can make the decision to live car-light as much as possible, or even car-free.  This depends a lot on where you live, but thankfully, most of us have some control over where we live.  We have found the site WalkScore.com very helpful in determining the most walkable neighborhoods in our city.  If you plan to change jobs or cities soon, that makes this lifestyle choice even easier: set up your life such that your home and work are both in walkable areas, preferably within walking and/or biking distance from each other.  Take advantage of the opportunities for walking, biking, and public transit that do exist in your community (and they exist in almost every community), and make sure your elected officials know that you support the type of infrastructure that makes this possible and enjoyable.  The chances are good that the less walkable your city/town/community is, the more access you will have to your local elected leaders, so make sure they know that you support infrastructure for walking and biking.

Imagine a residential area that is mixed-use so a stay-at-home mom can drop older kids at school, take little ones to the doctor or library, and pick up groceries on the way home, all without using a car. Imagine the money they will save for retirement, college, or just for that mom to be able to stay home. Imagine a child who grows up with walking as a way of life, built-in exercise and bonding time with parents or siblings. Imagine an elderly couple being able to stay fit and active in their community, without depending on their kids for a ride. This is what is at stake. This is what walkable, livable communities and smart growth are all about.

Car-Free Moment #2

As I ride more and more frequently for practical reasons, I find that riding is the easy part, even on hilly terrain or busy streets.  In fact, I enjoy mapping out new bicycle-friendly routes for myself and discovering the best ways to get somewhere on a bike.  The hard part is what to do with my bike when I get there.

Last weekend, I needed to make a trip to the pharmacy (and needed an excuse to use my new pannier bags), so I left the kids with Daddy (thanks, Honey) and hopped on the bike.  I hadn't ridden to this particular area before, so it was like a new little adventure on some different roads.

The ride there was uneventful; however, when I arrived, I realized that there was no bike rack to lock up my bike.  No signposts, no shopping cart racks, no trees, nothing.  The closest I could find to an immovable object was a rickety chain link fence, hardly immovable (or unbreakable) for an enterprising person.  Conveniently, though, there was a competing pharmacy across the street, with a beautifully solid bike rack visible  even from where I stood.  Eureka!  I was quite proud of myself, both for being so resourceful and for supporting a business that supported bicycling.

Of course, as these things happen, the bike-friendly pharmacy did not carry what I needed (how can it be so hard to find infant vitamin D drops when they're recommended for all breastfed babies?).  So, back I went, somewhat sheepishly, to the bicycle-hostile pharmacy.  I ended up locking my bike to the sturdy fence of the Starbuck's in the next parking lot.

It was not difficult, except that the footing was awkward as the fence was placed between a sidewalk and some decorative loose rocks.  Not used to my pannier bags and not considering the physics implications, I removed one pannier bag to move the bike closer, and the whole bike tipped over, scratching my leg on its way down.  Picking up my bike, I instinctively glanced around to make sure no one had noticed.  I hadn't realized it until that moment, but the pharmacy with no bike rack had three drive-through lanes on one side of the building, and I was in the direct line of sight of three drivers as I righted my bike and examined my injuries with embarrassment.

This pharmacy, which had not seen fit to provide any secure place for me to park my vehicle, had made it possible for not one, not two, but three motorists to simultaneously avoid even having to get out of theirs.

Smart Growth Strategies Can Improve Financial Bottom Line for Towns

Smart Growth America just released a report on the financial benefits of smart growth policies for municipalities.  They found that smart growth development saved towns an average of 38% on upfront infrastructure costs and 10% on ongoing services, and generated 10 times more revenue per acre than conventional suburban development.

Check out the full report on their website, http://www.smartgrowthamerica.org/2013/05/21/building-better-budgets-quantifies-average-savings-and-revenue-of-smart-growth-development/.

Book List

I would like to write reviews for some of these eventually, but in the meantime, here are some of my favorite books about smart growth and walkability, simple living, creativity, and parenting.

Smart Growth and Walkability

How to Live Well Without Owning a Car: Save Money, Breathe Easier, and Get More Mileage out of Life by Chris Balish

Walkable City: How Downtown Can Save America, One Step at a Time by Jeff Speck

The Smart Growth Manual by Andres Duany, Jeff Speck, and Mike Lydon

The Space Between: A Christian Engagement with the Built Environment by Eric O. Jacobsen

Pocket Neighborhoods: Creating Small-Scale Community in a Large-Scale World by Ross Chapin

Everyday Bicycling: How to Ride a Bike for Transportation (Whatever Your Lifestyle) by Elly Blue

Crafts, Cooking, and Creativity

Knitting for Baby by Melanie Falick and Kristin Nicholas

The Expectant Knitter: 30 Designs for Baby and Your Growing Family  by Marie Connolly

More Last-Minute Knitted Gifts by Joelle Hoverson and Anna Williams

Simply in Season by Cathleen Hockman-Wert and Mary Beth Lind

The Creative Family: How to Encourage Imagination and Nurture Family Connections by Amanda Blake Soule

Handmade Home: Simple Ways to Repurpose Old Materials into New Family Treasures by Amanda Blake Soule

Family, Parenting, Simplicity, and General Life

In Praise of Slowness: Challenging the Cult of Speed by Carl Honore

The Rhythm of Family: Discovering a Sense of Wonder through the Seasons by Amanda Blake Soule and Stephen Soule

Simplicity Parenting: Using the Extraordinary Power of Less to Raise Calmer, Happier, and More Secure Kids by Kim John Payne

The Baby Book: Everything You Need to Know About Your Baby from Birth to Age Two by William Sears, Martha Sears, Robert Sears, and James Sears

Living Outside the Box: TV-Free Families Share Their Secrets by Barbara Brock

Heaven on Earth: A Handbook for Parents of Young Children by Sharifa Oppenheimer

Adventures en Bus

Last week, I summoned up my courage to take both kids with me on the bus. We are lucky to have a bus line very close by (exceedingly lucky, if you look at how little of this area is covered by bus), and for my own sanity, I needed to get out of the house and give the bus-with-two-young-children thing a test run. With the baby in her wrap and the toddler pushing his own stroller, we set off.

The ride itself was relatively pleasant, as the driver and other passengers were indulgent and even doting to my little brood (two kids are nothing to write home about here). By the time I disembarked, I was feeling rather proud of myself for being so clever and resourceful... no sitting at home watching Sesame Street for us! It was at this point, as we were getting off the bus, that I realized there was a) no sidewalk, only a muddy, grassy curb between the road and a railroad track, and b) no crosswalk to get to our destination, in spite of its being directly across the street. The closest crosswalks were a good half mile in either direction. Hmm.

Why, one might well wonder, did the transit authority see fit to place a bus stop directly across the road from  a shopping area, but with no crosswalk to get there? Is this particular stop actually intended for hobos getting on and off the freight trains that occasionally pass by? Or, more likely, did no one give a moment's thought to who might be getting off at this stop, and why? Struggling to push my stroller through grass and mud to the nearest intersection, where I would study the traffic light timing until I could jaywalk least dangerously, I imagined it was probably the latter. The goal of this particular shopping area is clearly to get cars, not people, into the stores as quickly and efficiently as possible.

A Dream Deferred

True confession: I do not own a bike. Yes, I know. There is really no excuse for not having a working bike, especially when one is living car-free. To be fair, in the DC metro area where we lived for over five years with no car, we never had a need for bikes. We always lived within a 10- to 15-minute walk of a metro station, and we could get anyplace we needed to go on foot, by bus, by metro, or some combination thereof. As struggling grad students and then struggling "aw geez, we graduated in the middle of a recession" underemployed people, we never seemed to have the money to make such a purchase. Add to those factors small apartment living, with no storage space indoors for a bike, and here we are.

However, since moving back to the Pacific time zone late last year and eyeing the brand new, adorably optimistic bike lane painted on the local main road, I have been dreaming about how easily I could get from place to place, wind in my hair, on my very own grown-up two-wheeler. It has been a while, perhaps 15 years, since I sat on a bike, but I'm hoping it will come back to me like... well, you know.

Of course, the image in my mind of riding around town happily running errands has often included my two munchkins in tow, my two-year-old in a rear bike seat and my almost-two-month-old in a trailer in her car seat. Unfortunately, after a bit of Real Actual Research, I discovered that there doesn't seem to be a way to transport a baby under 9 or 12 months safely via bicycle in this country. To begin with, they don't make helmets sized for little babies, and besides, wearing a helmet in a car seat pushes the baby's neck into an awkward position and may restrict airflow. There is always the option of skipping the helmet, but ugh, that doesn't seem right either and may be illegal. This is not the Netherlands, or even Portland or San Francisco, where I would trust motorists not to injure us.  These are the real, honest-to-goodness exurbs here, after all. The shock value of seeing humans on a human-powered machine might offer some protection from the automobiles, but I'm not going to count on it.

So, my dream of transporting both babes via bike will have to wait. In the meantime, I'll work on getting myself onto my very own bike and building up the leg muscles and confidence to carry them with me soon enough.  Spokane Bike Swap, anyone?

Meet Walking Mama

Welcome to A Walking Mama.  I'm Heather, wife to a Really Smart Guy and mama to two little ones under the age of 4. We live a rich and fulfilling life without owning a car, and here I will focus in part on our carfree adventures and ideas for living more joyously without always depending on a personal automobile.

Walking is as central an activity to the human species as eating, sleeping, or breathing.  Sadly, though, in much of postwar America, the walking human has been relegated to outsider status to make way for the automobile. I will use this space to explore ideas about smart growth and strategies for recreating our cities on a human scale, with a particular eye to how growth policies affect families with children. If you care about anything - children, culture, beauty, recreation, health, social justice, prosperity - you should care about smart growth.

The other "walking" I do is more metaphorical: living on a human scale with my children and myself, trying to move slowly, simply, and deliberately through my days.  This means avoiding consumerism and the focus on more, better, and faster stuff. It means appreciating simple pleasures, enjoying public goods, respecting the natural rhythms of childhood and the seasons, and pursuing creativity in our home. Walking together, engaging our minds and bodies in our everyday pursuits,  is what we are trying to do in life and as a family.