Walkable Neighborhoods Benefit Property Values

Walkable areas are more prosperous than non-walkable areas in cities, according to the "Foot Traffic Ahead," report. The connection between density and prosperity might not be a surprise, but the extent of the connection might be surprising. "It’s not a trend confined to coastal cities; it’s on the rise in the Rust Belt, the Sun Belt, tech metropolises, government centers, innovation centers, and millennial magnets,” Patrick Sisson reports for Curbed.

Denser more walkable neighborhoods are continuing to become yet more dense and represent a larger share of the city’s wealth. "In Dallas, a poster child for sprawl, the 38 WalkUPs comprise 0.10 percent of metro land area, but 12 percent of metro GDP," Sisson writes.

Low-density areas with segregated building types lack the flexibility that denser areas have, the report argues, giving more walkable areas an advantage.