lndoor recreational walking in semi-public spaces : assessing demand and design standards

Encouragement and facilitation of walking for health and community benefits has recently become an important focus in the city planning and public health fields. Urban design guidelines have increasingly highlighted pedestrian transportation and recreation as important elements for community design. Although various techniques to increase walking such as crime prevention, traffic calming and streetscape improvements have been employed in cities and towns across North America, cold, icy and snowy weather conditions as well as other factors prevent many individuals from walking year round. This thesis identifies indoor walking spaces and programs as a potential supplement to outdoor walking spaces, discusses challenges and opportunities offered by these spaces and programs and highlights potential contributions to the community-building and public realm design. An assessment of demand for indoor walking programs and a review of best practices for implementation is presented through interviews with walkers, planners, planners, architects and health professionals across the United States and Canada. The results of these interviews reveal the existence of an interest in indoor walking, especially among retired senior citizens. In general, walkers are not particular about the aesthetic design of the places available for indoor walking, but stress the importance of having access to a reliable place to walk and a need for social interaction.

Department dc:contributor.department

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of Urban Studies and Planning.

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2009

Author dc:creator

• Duffy, Catherine Marie

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Susan Silberberg-Robinson.

• Urban Studies and Planning.

Statement dc:rights

• M.I.T. theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission. See provided URL for inquiries about permission.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/49697

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/49697