The town is being designed to provide walkable neighbourhoods to make walking a more attractive and safer option for local residents, and ensuring good quality connection between well located land uses. Making walking more easy and attractive than the car where the location of destinations allows is key to creating a shift away from the car. To create this;
All new homes will be situated in close proximity to local employment, shops, schools, community and leisure facilities, connected by the ‘Green Loop and Green Grid’ networks of pedestrian routes
All new homes will be within 400m (5 minute) walking distance from regular and reliable public transport systems.
The quality of pedestrian routes is important; they should be well-lit and safe to ensure that pedestrians feel secure, and clear signage for walking routes should be provided.
Streets will be designed to be slow-speed environments for use by all users, in accordance with Manual for Streets principles. This will include home-zones and shared spaces where priority is afforded to pedestrians, as well as reduced speed roads (including 20mph zones)
The following measures to encourage walking will also be included:
Encourage initiatives such as walking to school initially through ‘Walk to School Week’ then encourage the provision of ‘walking buses’ and WOW initiatives (Walk on a Wednesday) at individual schools .
Promotion of internet shopping and delivery services from local shops to make shopping without a car much easier
Market the health aspects of walking at the ‘transport hub’ and through the web site, residential and employer information packs as well as through staff forums and residents groups
Journeys to education account for 11% of all journeys, therefore a good place to start is by providing alternatives to driving a car. Apart from other obvious health benefits of walking, it makes for a much more interesting and educational route to school to not just be driven. More information is provided within the Education Travel Strategy in Section 5.3.
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