Study: District’s White People Walk More, Faster Than Non-Whites
The Transportation Research Board is meeting in D.C. this week, bringing 11,000 transportation nerds to three hotels over five days and hundreds of scintillating agenda items. Most of the papers being presented are on things I wouldn't understand, but one caught my eye: A study of pedestrian behavior in the District using 2009 National Household Travel Survey data, breaking down pedestrian, car, and public transit trips by race, age, and income.
The researcher, Jacquelyn Renée Schneider of the Institute of Transportation Studies at the University of California Davis, first made note of the fact that District residents travel more walk and take public transit in D.C. than Americans generally, probably due to the District's relatively human-scaled and compact neighborhoods. But the numbers differ across demographic groups, most notably race: On average, Schneider found, white people take more trips per day overall, at 4.9 trips to non-whites' 4.1 trips. For walking trips, they go further, traveling between 0.02 and 0.21 miles more per trip than non-whites. But white people are apparently walking faster, because they also take less time per trip, averaging 12.39 minutes to non-white-peoples' 14.65 minutes.
Why the differential? Schneider hypothesizes that it could have to do with the fact that whites are more centrally located, and it's more often convenient to walk. She also guesses, vaguely, that "maybe non-whites take longer to complete pedestrian trips because they are more sensitive to topographical, environmental, health or other related factors impacting speed including their personal liking of travel and opinions about physical exercise."
I'd also be curious about the impact of crime, though I'm not sure there's less of it in neighborhoods with more white people. But I do think the first theory comes closest to the truth—generally speaking, the most heavily African-American areas of the city are also the most suburban (though obviously that also applies to some rich white areas, like the Palisades and Spring Valley). Which just reinforces something we already know: In order to make people walk more, you need to give them things to walk to, not assume that there's something intrinsic to race that makes people enjoy walking more or less.
Photo by Darrow Montgomery
6:11 pm
White folk walk like this! And bla...oh, never mind...
7:06 pm
Maybe they are afraid of getting robbed?
10:46 pm
Pointless research
7:12 am
Love it. The article is about "white people," - how awkward and weird is that? - and the photo shows four "black people."
Yes, silly and pointless.
Why did I read?
8:45 am
WTH.... Did I miss somehing? Was the whole point of this artile just to say that whites walk faster than blacks opps (non-whites)
9:07 am
Methinks this has to do with age more than anything. White folks in DC are younger on average than black folks in DC; ergo, white folks walk faster.
9:12 am
Nothing like a good study to show how white people are healthier and wealthier and higher educated and...etc then the rest of us
9:17 am
Huh, And I used to think it was racist to complain that black people are always in my way when I'm trying to walk down the sidewalk. Now I have scientific validation!
(tongue in check)
9:48 am
I wonder if there's any correlation between education and health?
9:56 am
Really? I mean..really???? SMH
10:00 am
I could make some racist, blanketed statements based on this study's result, but instead I will accept the fact that non-whites are slow and lazy.
10:02 am
I think people who walk more walk faster, because they want to get where they are going. So it stands to reason that if white people are walking faster, it's because they are walking more, not because they are white.
10:27 am
If they studied only those trips where people were crossing the street, the numbers would be even more skewed.
11:32 am
maybe non white dc residents are more likely to be walking with children than white residents who live in walkable areas, who tend to be younger and childless?
try speedwalking with a five year old in tow.
11:43 am
This isnt true.....most if not all of those folks spend their time looking at their fruit (BlackBerries and Apple Iphones) while in the way on the street!!!!!
11:53 am
black people are stopping and chatting with their homies. also unemployment is higher so that they don't have a boss requiring them to be there on time.
4:26 pm
I think it's worth noting that black people have higher rates of obesity than white people in DC -- accordingly, obesity rates are lowest in Ward 2 and 3 and highest in Ward 7 and 8. That could be one explanation for why they are slower walkers. In addition, blacks have higher rates of lung disease (mostly from smoking) than whites in DC. Another explanation for why they are slower walkers.
"maybe non-whites take longer to complete pedestrian trips because they are more sensitive to topographical, environmental, health or other related factors impacting speed including their personal liking of travel and opinions about physical exercise."
^ this is a very convoluted and verbose way of saying that black people are lazy.
5:49 pm
Simple fact: Overall, blacks walk slower than whites (as a whole) in DC. My guess is that it's a cultural thing because it's so noticably purvasive.
1:01 am
Wow, this piece is so politically reflexive. Just tripping over itself to be "correct".
Can we get a "study" on how the "District's White People" cross the street? Could it be true they're the only pedestrians using crosswalks? While "non-white people" cross the street any damn place they please, especially in front of moving traffic?
Let's be honest, if you eat at McDonald's every day (a company that aggressively exploits "urban populations") you're going to be a fat, slow, and borderline diabetic.
Two words: natural selection.
And by the way, there are Africans and there are Americans but there is no such thing as "African American"...except in the minds of deluded Americans who fetishize race.
America is the only country arrogant enough to reductively compact an entire continent into politically expedient shorthand...out of guilt. The correct usage would be Ghanaian-American or Namibian-American. But nevermind. As long as we make people feel good.
When you're ready to start referring to all white people as "European American" instead of "white people" you let me know.
2:14 am
So...who's behind this planted little piece of "PR"? ;) Sadly, CityPaper's articles are becoming increasingly ridiculous. And just think, someone actually gets paid to write this stuff, that is...if you want to consider it writing. SMH
1:13 pm
@comment #19
If anything, an American should be called an American, regardless of race. They are not called African-Americans out of guilt, there are PLENTY of races who use the double connection(asian-amer, latin-amer, euro-amer etc). Now, fact is, most African-Americans due their ancestors from not so long ago, being bring brought here by the slave trade, cannot use a term such as Ghanaian-American because 95% cannot trace where they came from without doing a full on genealogy test. An African American is an African born in America. Simple and plain.
In regards to this article, it is a total waste or supposed research, and time for both the readers and the writers.