As you may know from my Instagram, I’ve been reading this book called Walkable City about how good and proper city and urban planning can lead to a generally more healthy and happy population. I’m just getting into the book now, but already certain things are standing out, like the excerpt below about car-centric cities.

Despite spending one dollar out six on health care, the United States has some of the worst health statistics in the developed world. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control (CDC), fully one-third of American children born after 2000 will become diabetics. This is due partly to diet, but partly to planning: the methodical eradication from our communities of the useful walk has helped to create the least active generation in American history. This insult is compounded by the very real injuries that result from car crashes — the greatest killer of children and young adults nationwide — as well as an asthma epidemic tied directly to vehicle exhaust. Comparison of walkable cities and auto-depending suburbs yields some eye-opening statistics — for example, that transit users are more than three times as likely as drivers to achieve their CDC-recommended thirty minutes of daily physical activity. INcreasingly, it is becoming clear that the American healthcare crisis is largely an urban-design crisis, with walkability at the heart of the cure.

Killing myself slowly…