Totally untested take that might be 100% wrong in several ways, tell me if I am:
Walking advocacy has had trouble attracting heat, because everyone just… does it. But runners are organized in clubs, persnickety about routes, and maybe can be engaged to fight for better pedestrian networks, maybe?
@bikepedantic there are definitely walking clubs but they are frequently active around and about specific areas: malls, parks, etc. I think utilitarian walking is viewed as shameful things that poor people do.
@bikepedantic
I have noticed this as well, especially when I served on our local bike/ped advisory board. The board always discounted the importance of pedestrian facilities because no one came to advocate for them...because no one considered it a "special interest."
@bikepedantic
I do feel like it's changing, with special interest forming around certain aspects of walking (eg to school) but there's still no general walking advocacy here, neither locally or at the state level. Like others have noted, people who walk are assumed to be poor, brown, or moms, none of whom get welcomed into our local transportation advocacy space very well
In the context of the Netherlands, municipalities are increasingly embracing the STOMP principle. That states that public spaces should first accommodate walking, then bicycling, then PT, then shared mobility, and lastly the privately owned car.
But it's hard to implement IRL, even here. 50 years of car centered spatial planning has made society car dependent and blind for the interests of people that have to depend on walking.
@bikepedantic
I also wonder if it's because we assume accommodating walking is simple, but it's more complicated than just building sidewalks -- you have to also get the built environments and land uses right. And maybe most mobility advocacy groups don't see that as part of their bag.
@DrTCombs @bikepedantic Generally if you're dependent on walking to get around, you're probably not making it out to the board meeting
@bikepedantic So, in Indiana it's absolutely true that bike trails are billed as recreational amenities and advocated for by recreational cycling orgs, and also that the primary beneficiaries of those projects are commuters. This has a lot to do with who has the resources to be both a recreational cyclist and an activist.
So it makes perfect sense to me that mixed-use/running trails would get the same boost from runner advocacy, because runners are in the same class and have similar complaints
@bikepedantic sounds like it holds water, yes.