Why Pedestrian Counts?

At the core of a healthy and thriving city is an environment that promotes and supports people on foot. Pedestrians keep the streets safe by providing a community presence. Pedestrians support the local economy by frequenting local stores and services. They also contribute to a sense of community by offering opportunities for social interaction. 

As indicated by the findings of the Neighborhood Dialogue and the Healthy Neighborhoods Survey, pedestrian-oriented neighborhoods are of top concern to Seattle citizens.  Community leaders representing the business communities of our SUNI neighborhoods also indicated that pedestrian activity was one of the most important indicators of a thriving neighborhood business district.  The City of Seattle is pushing hard to create a more pedestrian-oriented city as a key strategy for building a more sustainable city.  In fact, reducing the reliance on the automobile and supporting alternative transportation such as biking, walking, and public transportation were key recommendations of Mayor Nickels' Green Ribbon Commission on Climate Protection to help Seattle significantly reduce global warming pollution to meet or beat the goals of the Kyoto Protocol. 

Methodology

Sustainable Seattle developed its methodology for conducting pedestrian counts through research into existing methodologies, conversations with staff at Seattle's Department of Transportation and Feet First, a local non-profit focused on promoting pedestrian activity, and input from community leaders from each of the 10 SUNI neighborhoods.

Five students from the University of Washington's Service Learning Program were recruited and trained to count pedestrians in our 10 SUNI neighborhoods.  One intersection in each of the 10 neighborhood business districts was selected by each community.  To see the list of neighborhoods and intersections, click here.  From October 2005 to February 2006, pedestrians were counted during eight one-hour shifts: 11am-12pm, 1pm-2pm, 5pm-6pm and 7pm-8pm on a Saturday and a weekday (Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday). Counts were not conducted during holidays. To see a summary of the pedestrian count sampling plan, click here.

For each count, students were instructed to track the number of people crossing any of the four directions of the intersection.  Each crossing was counted so if a pedestrian crossed the intersection more than once during the one-hour shift, they were counted more than once. Students also noted additional information about pedestrians such as the number of people carrying shopping bags, pushing stroller/babies, and walking dogs.

Findings

56 hours of pedestrian counts were initially conducted in Sustainable Seattle's 10 SUNI neighborhoods.  This fell short of the proposed 80 hours (eight one-hour counts in each neighborhood) due to difficulties getting data from one student.  As a result, we asked our Youth Interns to complete the full eighty hours of counts for several neighborhoods (Capitol Hill, Chinatown-ID, Greenwood-Phinney, Lake City, and Uptown). As of March of 2007 all of the pedestrian count hours have been completed.  Our findings are summarized below.

To see a summary of the 80 pedestrian counts, click here.

Please note that it is not particularly useful to compare counts across neighborhoods as the 10 neighborhoods vary in density, size, and character. 

Students also documented the number of people with shopping bags, strollers/babies, and dogs.



The table below presents pedestrian count findings and density-related information for each of 10 SUNI neighborhoods.  This supplemental data may be useful to consider when reviewing the pedestrian count data because the character, density, and size of the 10 neighborhoods and their business districts vary.

Neighborhood (click on the neighborhood name to see each pedestrian count graph)	Comprehensive Plan Designation	Households/Acre (2004)	Persons/Acre (2000)
Admiral	Residential Urban Village	10	16
East Ballard	NA	*	*
Capitol Hill	Urban Center	31	48
Chinatown-ID	Urban Center	11	17
Columbia City	Residential Urban Village	6	16
Greenwood-Phinney	Residential Urban Village	16	21
Lake City	Hub Urban Village	13	13
North Beacon Hill	Residential Urban Village	9	25
Uptown	Urban Center	15	15
Wallingford	Residential Urban Village	10	19

Supplemental data come from Census 2000 statistics and from the Urban Village Element and Urban Village Appendix of Seattle's Comprehensive Plan.