What's Your Home's Walk Score?

One of the reasons my wife and I choose our home was the location. It's convenient to downtown Olympia, it's on the busline, and many destinations are easily walkable. We live within a half-mile or so of three grocery stores, a dozen restaurants, tennis courts, and several parks. A movie theater, mall, banks, video stores, postal store, and bookstores are less than a mile away.

But I didn't know there was a way to quantify "walkability" until I ran across Walk Score, a website that identifies and promotes walkable neighborhoods. Their mission, the website says, is to "help homebuyers, renters, and real estate agents find houses and apartments in great neighborhoods. Walk Score shows you a map of what's nearby and calculates a Walk Score for any property. Buying a house in a walkable neighborhood is good for your health and good for the environment."

The site isn't completely accurate. I noticed that it counted two local grocery store's offices as actual stores, for example. But it gives a good overall impression of a neighborhood's walkability.

My home's walk score is 60. Which makes me wonder where you'd have to live to score 80 or 90 or 100.

I checked up on my family, of course. My mother's home has a score of just 15, but then again...she lives on lakefront property, so that's some consolation. My sister's score is 6 (yikes!). The Prudential Olympia, REALTORS office scores in at 63 (but I wouldn't want to LIVE here!).

What's your walk score?