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Walk Score is a website that ranks the walkability of neighborhoods. Just type in an address, and it will calculate the walk score based on location to stores, restaurants, schools, parks, etc.

I think this is a good idea but, at least in Albuquerque, it doesn’t seem to work well. Unfortunately, based on some of the addresses I tested, the information isn’t always accurate.

I ran several addresss and the information is pretty interesting–let’s take a look at the results.

Example One:

Revi Don and Spain: just west of Morris and North of Montgomery.

The Mountain Run Shopping Center includes a grocery store, Subway, and Walgreens shows as being 0.37 miles, but my Google map shows 1.1 miles. Still walkable, but not next door.

The park location mentioned is Academy Hills Park, a very nice park located across from the Mountain Run Shopping Center which, as we learned, is 1.1 miles away. For some reason, the tool fails to mention the equally nice park, El Oso Grande, located 0.3 miles away–a much more walkable park than the first one.

The bookstore mentioned is labelled "TVI Bookstore," which is a community college bookstore–not what you would probably be looking for. By the way, the "TVI Community College" is now known as the CNM Community College, which hasn’t been updated.

Ok, this one is missing the mark, so let’s try another neighborhood.

Example Two:

For this example, we are going to the Four Hills neighborhood, located in SE Albuquerque. I located Lanier SE, a small area of new townhomes, which is southeast of Central and Four Hills Blvd.

The tool shows that the Albertsons grocery store is 1.95 miles away, when it is actually about 0.3 miles. The La Luz de Amistad Park is indeed about 0.2 miles away as shown, but this is more of a green spot than a family park. The tool seems to calculate the restuarants correctly. Most of the bars are over three miles away, making them a bit of a stretch to include in the lineup. But when compared to the 8.78 miles to the Sunshine Theatre, they are just a short stroll. Would you consider 8.78 miles a walkable neighborhood location?

Example Three:

I think the UNM South area is a very walkable neighborhood. Let’s find out how the tool measures up. We’ll start at the corner of Gold and Terrance.

The Smith’s Food and Drug at Lead and Yale is accurate at 0.33 miles. The Frontier Restaurant, a long-time fixture in the UNM area, is shown at 0.29 miles–close enough to Google’s 0.4 miles. This time, the Sunshine Theatre shows up at a more walkable 1.37 miles. Looks like we have our winning example!

Overall, we had two misses and one hit. Actually, I think the more walkable a neighborhod is, the more accurate this tool is. If you are not familiar with an area, it is important to work with an agent who knows the neighborhoods and can help you locate the right one for your lifestyle. While a website tool like this might be fun to play with, it doesn’t replace competant local expertise. That’s where I come in. If you are relocating to Albuquerque and need help finding the right neighborhood for you, drop me an email or give me a call.