Want to lose weight? Get out and walk… and tell your city planners to help:
Just ask Mick Cornett, mayor of Oklahoma City, Okla., about the benefits of planning. No one was more aware of the city’s reputation as one of the nation’s fattest than Cornett. After successfully losing 40 pounds, Cornett thought it might be possible to get residents fired up about losing weight too.
So back in 2007, Cornett introduced an initiative called “This City Is Going On a Diet.” Residents could sign up on the program’s website and log their weight loss journeys. A couple years later, Cornett embarked on infrastructure projects to make the city easier to get around by foot or bike. Funded by a sales tax and a multimillion-dollar bond issue, sidewalks, bike and walking paths, and a world-class rowing center popped up in the downtown area. (Cornett was honored in 2010 for these efforts by this magazine.)
In 2012, Cornett reported that Oklahoma City’s residents had collectively lost 1 million pounds, a result he credits in large part to providing more opportunities for getting around without cars. “Our downtown went from being one of the least pedestrian-friendly to one of the most pedestrian-friendly,” Cornett says. “It’s a destination now where you can park your car and walk around” [Mattie Quinn, “The Walking Cure: How Oklahoma City Lost 1 Million Pounds,” Governing, January 2017].
Walk more, weigh less—that’s not rocket science. It’s personal choice boosted with city planning that makes room for pedestrians and pedalists.
Sioux Falls and Rapid City actually don’t differ much from Oklahoma City on WalkScore.com’s ratings of walkability and bikeability. But 2010 CDC body weight data show fewer of us making fight weight than OKC and other more walkable and bikeable metros:
| City | Walk/Bike Score | Healthy Weight (2010) |
| Oklahoma City | 32/40 | 35.1% |
| New York City | 89/65 | 40.5% |
| Washington, DC | 77/69 | 37.8% |
| Chicago | 78/70 | 38.8% |
| Minneapolis/St.Paul | M: 68/81 S:58/62 | 38.4% |
| Sioux Falls | 36/46 | 33.3% |
| Rapid City | 29/ — | 32.3% |
| Denver | 60/71 | 43.0% |
| Seattle | 73/63 | 42.3% |
| Los Angeles | 66/56 | 37.5% |
I know it’s a darned cold day to say it, but get out and walk!
p.s.: Walking in the cold will burn a few more calories than walking on a spring day.
Living at altitude (see Denver’s numbers) is also a great way to lose some weight, as I discovered during my month at 9,000 feet in Quito. It just takes more calories to get the fewer oxygen molecules per cubic foot of atmosphere into the blood stream.
Walking in Memorial Park in Rapid city has the added bonus of seeing Bald Eagles in the open Cottonwood branches.
Let’s do away with drive up windows of all kinds…People will walk more then. Everything can be done sitting on our butts…Sad deal. The #1 complaint that college students have is that they have to walk from the parking lot to their residence hall. Really? You are too soft.
Walkability is great. I’m all for it. That’s why I hate new urbanism developments. It tends to want everything within “walking distance.” Their walking distance and my walking distance is different. If I’m going for a walk, it’s not to the corner grocery to pay exorbitant prices for food that I then have to try to lug back to my residence. The two block walk isn’t enough to get the heart rate up, and the walk back with a load of over-priced groceries is not fun.
Malls are the best place to walk in a bad Northern Midwest winter. Some of these “lifestyle centers” that try to recreate a downtown in the suburbs are just not going to do it for the elderly, the disabled and the cold averse. But these folks can drive or bus to the local enclosed mall, that always disparaged 1960s development concept, and walk for miles in complete comfort. Disabled folks often have a hard to negotiating snow and ice covered walks, in spite of shoveling ordinances and mandated curb cuts at corners. They can go to the mall and find lots of clear walking space.
Another good thing is greenway or bike trails. Everyone uses them where I live.
SD cities should spend some money on elevated walkways for pedestrians, cyclists, and small electric grocery mobiles. Make walking safe and protected from at least some of the weather and people will do more walking. Might also reduce for widening streets and urban highways.
Incidentally, This comment is not spam despite your CMS indicating such.
Richard! Interesting! Thinner air causing the body to work harder—I hadn’t thought about that. Is your weight loss typical for folks who move from our relative lowlands to the mountains?
Bear—yes! along with weight loss, walking lets one see more cool stuff, and see it for longer. It’s a lot easier to stop and watch something on the sidewalk than in the middle of traffic. (Oops—but now I need to check to see if more walkable cities also report more people late for work.)
Wayne—can we keep walk-up windows? When I’m walking my dog, I sometimes stop at the gas station for a gallon of milk. :-) And good grief, yes, tell those college kids to toughen up. (I seem to recall that Harvard used to prohibit students from having cars on campus.)
Donald—trails! greenways! Build them, and people will come. Snow and ice do hinder, but we can keep building and removing as many obstacles as we can until global warming removes the weather obstacles of November to March.
I believe it is a common experience. Of course not all the cause can be laid at the height of the mountains. the diet in Ecuador also benefits from 90% of all the food (both in groceries stores, and markets and in restaurants) being 100% organic. The differences in the taste of foods one is accustomed to in the states is an interesting learning as well. The all grass fed milk, for example, has a downright sweetness to it. Pork and Beef, quite different to US. Seafood – always fresh caught that day. Only in the “gringo” areas of the supermarkets will you find frozen vegetables , entrees etc.items. Unlike US stores, the frozen foods sections are miniscule. Typically 10-12 different varieties of potatoes, bigger sections of chocolates and herbal teas than either canned goods or frozen, just for example.
I like this potato selection you describe, Mr. Schriever, and the candies too. Were there a large variety of wines and beers and whiskeys in these Ecuador groceries? I would tell you that no matter what is eaten if a fellow goes up really high and doesn’t not pound some hefty calories into his maw he will lose a lot of weight. They make you pound food into your maw when you go up way higher, I am told.
Grudz. The Andes in this area are the place where taters were first domesticated. It is said there are 800 varieties of tater grown in Ecuador. Almost all meals come with fried taters.
And yes – the beer and wine and liquor section of the Supermaxi was both sides of one aisle – the entire length of the store.
PokemonGO provides ample motivation to get out and walk, even in the winter… Nothing like taking a short walk to go catch the Pikachu down the street.
It sounds like a fine place, Mr. Schriever. Fry up a few fuzzy rats on a stick to go with the taters and vast beers and we have a fine dinner for you and I.