'What do you wish you could do within walking distance of your home?

[Pointby2]

We have restaurants, groceries, ice cream and a nice bar 1.2 miles away. But it means walking back up a 500 ft hill. We only make that walk a few times a year. And I'm a runner!

 

[Car-Guy]

We have restaurants, groceries, ice cream and a nice bar 1.2 miles away. But it means walking back up a 500 ft hill. We only make that walk a few times a year. And I'm a runner!

But think how much easier the walk is coming back home.

 

[KarenF]

We live in a suburb west of Atlanta right outside the perimeter. We can walk to a library, Starbucks, several restaurants, ice cream and the Silver Comet Trail where we can bike.100 miles.

 

[youbet]

Yeah, we have this. Can shoot from our kitchen deck and have a pond on the property that the deer love. But, if and when we sell out, we'll likely go to the other extreme and get a place with walking score of 90-100, rather than 0-5. Nothing wrong with either extreme; pick your flavor of tradeoff!

Here in the city, we shoot from our decks, windows, porches, etc., all the time. It's routine, a part of our culture.

 

[Rocket Man]

I would like to be able to walk to a few restaurants, cafes and/or coffee shops and a grocery store. Preferably some outdoor seating at the eating/drinking establishments when the weather is conducive. However, not in a large or medium size city.

 

[Gumby]

Things within one mile of my house, which I never have to leave the sidewalk to get to:

hospital with emergency room, my doctor, the young wife's doctor, our vet, two pharmacies, the train station, city hall, courthouse, post office, UPS store, two gyms, library, police station, fire station, the town green, public park with walking trails through the woods, six tennis courts, eight ball fields, two swimming pools, seven banks, seven churches, three marinas, two beaches, five grocery stores, two auto parts stores, three car dealerships, five auto repair shops, five liquor stores (including Total Wine), nine gas stations, four ice cream shops, 25 restaurants of all different types (almost half are within 1/4 mile) and many, many other things.

I like it here.

 

[Music Lover]

^^

That's far too busy and crowded for me.

 

[Ronstar]

Things within one mile of my house, which I never have to leave the sidewalk to get to:

hospital with emergency room, my doctor, the young wife's doctor, our vet, two pharmacies, the train station, city hall, courthouse, post office, UPS store, two gyms, library, police station, fire station, the town green, public park with walking trails through the woods, six tennis courts, eight ball fields, two swimming pools, seven banks, seven churches, three marinas, two beaches, five grocery stores, two auto parts stores, three car dealerships, five auto repair shops, five liquor stores (including Total Wine), nine gas stations, four ice cream shops, 25 restaurants of all different types (almost half are within 1/4 mile) and many, many other things.

I like it here.

That would be a nightmare for me. Lots of things = lots of congestion. Things within a mile of our house:

A few lakes, boat ramp, and a small sledding hill.

12 houses in our census block of 66.5 acres.

 

[Gumby]

^^

That's far too busy and crowded for me.

If you were sitting on my front porch or in my yard, you wouldn't see any of those things except the marinas and wouldn't hear anything but the occasional train going by, the fire engine going out on a call or the carillon on the Methodist church. Almost no cars drive on my street and the only people I ever see are the dog walkers, although sometimes on summer weekends, they have foot races through my neighborhood since it is attractive and with little traffic

 

[Andre1969]

We used to live in a big house on 10 1/2 wooded acres in a rural area and it was great as a retreat when we were younger and working, but when we retired we decided we needed a complete change. Trust me looking at the woods and wildlife is wonderful but 24/7 it gets lonely and not to mention the work of a big house and property. Not good for aging.

That's sort of my situation right now. I'm on 6 1/2 acres. I'd say maybe 1/3 of it is wooded. For the time being, I do like the seclusion. However, I'm only 52, and I do wonder, sometimes, what it will be like, as I get older.

It's actually not TOO much work, at the time being. The house dates to 1968, but had a major renovation in 2008. Basically they built a new house on top of the old foundation. The driveway splits the property roughly down the middle, and when I cut the grass, I do one side one day, and the other side on another day, so I don't feel too overwhelmed. It usually takes maybe 1.5-2 hours per side, depending on how much I let the grass grow between cuttings.

It's actually less work than my old house, which was on 4 1/2 acres, but mostly wooded. I could cut that entire yard in maybe 75-90 minutes. But the house dated to 1916, and was constantly needing something. And the way it was landscaped was pretty high-maintenance.

But, I can see a time when this place, perhaps, gets to be too much. There's also really not very much within walking distance, and the roads are narrow, with no sidewalk and even no shoulder in many cases, so it's not all that safe. About a mile from me, there's a liquor store that also sells milk, bread and other basics. Next door to it is a carry-out/delivery place called Milano Pizza. They also sell subs and such. They're a bit pricey, but pretty good. Next door to that, there's a tiny little plaza that has a tree service, an "Illuminate" salon, a Bean Rush Cafe, a martial arts studio, and a fitness center. And a Berman Cleaners across the street.

So, basically, not much. There's also a small local park. It's about a half-mile if you drive it, but I can walk through the woods in my back yard and hop the fence if I really want to. It's on the back side of a hill though, so it's easier to hop over, than to climb back! It has maybe 3/4 of a mile of walking trails, a tennis court, basketball court, playground, and some fields where you can play baseball, soccer, football, etc.

But, as rural as it sounds, Annapolis is only about 10 minutes away. And I can be in DC or Baltimore in under 30, depending on traffic.

For the time being, I think the only thing I'd really want added to the neighborhood is sidewalks or at least shoulders on the road, to make it more walk-friendly. It probably wouldn't make me any more likely to patronize the local businesses, though. I buy most of my booze in bulk at a discount liquor store, although I do stop in the local one on occasion if I just need something quick. I rarely eat out, so I probably wouldn't go to that pizza place. The only reason I know they have good subs is my uncle stops off there sometimes and surprises me with food. And I tend not to buy clothes that are nice enough to need a dry cleaner! But, it would be nice to be able to just get out and walk around the neighborhood.

 

[old medic]

Things within one mile of my house, which I never have to leave the sidewalk to get to:

Made me look at Google maps...
One country store/ gas station.
5 different orchards.
3-4 dozen homes.
There a several directions I can walk in a straight line for over a mile and not walk thru a yard

 

[Dreamer]

If you were sitting on my front porch or in my yard, you wouldn't see any of those things except the marinas and wouldn't hear anything but the occasional train going by, the fire engine going out on a call or the carillon on the Methodist church. Almost no cars drive on my street and the only people I ever see are the dog walkers, although sometimes on summer weekends, they have foot races through my neighborhood since it is attractive and with little traffic

This sounds ideal to me.

 

[RetireEarly50s]

Have several coffee shops, restaurants, markets all within a mile, also hiking and biking trails, use all frequently, only problem is we side a street that keeps getting busier and busier since we bought our house 3 years ago so looking at other options but finding the same walkability is proving very difficult.

 

[ownyourfuture]

I’d like to walk out my back door into a natural area where are few if any other humans

Ditto. I hope to make that a reality sometime this year.

 

[Andre1969]

About 5-6 years ago, a house went up for sale near Carlisle, PA, that I had a bit of a fascination with. It was close to the fairgrounds, where I go for a lot of my car shows. the property also backed up to the Appalachian Trail, which I thought was really cool. Not that I'd ever have the ambition to do it, but I thought it would be cool to have a place like that, where I could just walk right out my back yard, and get on a trail that could take me from Maine to Georgia.

Maybe saying "backed up to the Appalachian Trail" is a bit misleading. The property didn't abut the trail itself, but rather a piece of property that the trail cut across. You would have to walk perhaps a couple hundred feet through the woods to actually get to the trail. I dunno what their regulations are on disturbing nature like that, but even they didn't permit that, there's a spot where the trail crosses a road, maybe a quarter mile away, where I'd be able to pick it up proper.

I still think about that house sometimes. I never actually went in it, but drove past it once or twice. Nice little ~1800 square foot farm house built in 1920, on about 4.3 acres, with a barn. Looks like the middle of nowhere, but only a few minutes from Carlisle, and not that far from Harrisburg. It ended up selling for $260K, just a bit less than the $630K I paid for my house, a few months later.

Sometimes I look back on it and think man, if I had bought that house instead of this one, I probably could have retired on the spot! But, then I wonder if I would've been happy. I think that area is just further enough north, compared to me, that it's enough to make the winters more harsh in general, so I imagine it might get a bit bleak and depressing in the colder months. And, while I have a few friends in the general area, it would feel like starting over. In contrast, where I'm at now, is only about 15 miles from the old house, so it's close enough to still feel like "home". Also, going from a ~1500 square foot 1916 home that used to be a store with an apartment on the second level, to an ~1800 square foot 1920 farmhouse isn't much of a jump. Redfin and Zillow still have pics of the house online, and when I look through the pics, and see those tiny rooms, with the baseboard heat, and the window shaker a/c units, it makes me a bit more grateful for what I ended up with!

 

[eytonxav]

Play pickleball

 

[RunningBum]

Maybe saying "backed up to the Appalachian Trail" is a bit misleading. The property didn't abut the trail itself, but rather a piece of property that the trail cut across. You would have to walk perhaps a couple hundred feet through the woods to actually get to the trail. I dunno what their regulations are on disturbing nature like that, but even they didn't permit that, there's a spot where the trail crosses a road, maybe a quarter mile away, where I'd be able to pick it up proper.

In the section of the AT that I help maintain, they don't like "social trails" that connect into the AT. Where allowed trails connect in or cross, there is some marking or even signage to guide people. If other trails are allowed to spring up, they'd have to do a lot more marking and that's too hard to keep up with, and it can be confusing to AT hikers which trail to follow. But nobody is going to say anything about bushwhacking through woods to get to the trail, or even moving fallen branches to make it a little easier.

 

[Andre1969]

In the section of the AT that I help maintain, they don't like "social trails" that connect into the AT. Where allowed trails connect in or cross, there is some marking or even signage to guide people. If other trails are allowed to spring up, they'd have to do a lot more marking and that's too hard to keep up with, and it can be confusing to AT hikers which trail to follow. But nobody is going to say anything about bushwhacking through woods to get to the trail, or even moving fallen branches to make it a little easier.

Thanks for the info on that, it's something I was definitely curious about. And definitely understandable, that they wouldn't want obvious trails connecting up to it, as that could be confusing! I always thought of the Appalachian Trail as this really big, wide trail, but the one section that ran behind this house was probably only about a foot and a half wide, and some of the low vegetation hung over that.

FWIW, here's where the section of trail I walked crossed a road: https://www.google.com/maps/@40.183...4!1saHePdy0sHpNgBsxJB6QdlQ!2e0!7i16384!8i8192

Another thing I've always wondered about the Appalachian Trail...where do people set up camp? Are there clearings every so often where people can do that? I had walked perhaps a mile of the trail in this particular area, and that's my only experience with it, so I didn't get to see much. The part I walked on had two small parking lots, one where it crossed each road. Other than that, it mainly went through the woods, actually cut across a pasture, with a small staircase over the fence, so people could cross, but the cows couldn't get out, skirted a cornfield, and then went around some kind of orchard.

 

[MarieIG]

I lived in Manhattan for the better part of 5 years when I was at college at NYU, then stayed in the area for another year when I began working full-time in lower Manhattan. I liked being walking distance from everything, from supermarkets to dry cleaners to the post office to the subway to having branches of my local bank near where I lived and my office.

When I eventually wanted more mobility by being able to own a car, I moved out of Manhattan back to Long Island (where I grew up) but west enough to keep my commute short enough to be tolerable (until it grew on me too much after 15 years). I lived in the downtown area of 2 different villages so I could walk to the LIRR, most importantly (to eliminate station parking), and to continue enjoying what I liked about living in Manhattan. I still lived near a post office, dry cleaners, laundromat, library, and small grocery store (in the first village). Some places were walkable, some were either a little too far.

In my current place, I have my bank, post office, library, a mini-mart, several pizza joints, barbershop. and, very importantly, my car mechanic so I can drop off the car and walk back home. I do have to drive to a supermarket and pharmacy (which are next to each other), so I sometimes wish I could walk to them. I still have my LIRR station although I have ridden the LIRR only 3 times since I retired 14 years ago (YAY, right, MarieIG?).

LOL, Yes! Parking by the LIRR was yet another issue. Being able to walk to the station was/ is a huge plus. DS reported that with some new developments (opening up Grand Central Station and changes to trains between Jamaica and Atlantic Terminal?) there were some massive delays. Imagine that.

I haven't been on the LIRR since approximately 3/4/20.

 

[RunningBum]

https://appalachiantrail.org/explore/hike-the-a-t/thru-hiking/camping-regulations/ has good info on camping. Generally people are encouraged to camp out of sight of the trail, but I know that isn't always followed. There are shelters on the AT that are ideally spaced a day's hike apart, but that varies. Near some road crossings are hostels that cater to AT hikers. On the 1.1 mile stretch I maintain, I know of four clearings that are used. Two of them are discouraged, because one is about 10 feet from the trail, and the other is adjacent to the mountain resort where I live, which only has one exit and camping increases the fire risk. A third has a worn path to a good clearing ~200 feet off trail, which I don't block off. The fourth is adjacent to short side trail to a day picnic area and I've only seen campsites a good distance away from both

There are a lot of books and guides out there for hikers. FarOut (formerly GutHook) is probably the best (pay) app out there. I believe it uses GPS to locate you on the trail and gives you options for camping/lodging, water sources, supply stops, etc.

We are told to trail to maintain a 4 foot wide by 8 foot high corridor. Hikers hate tight trails because it's so easy to pick up ticks if you brush against foliage. Some places are harder to get to than others to maintain. Others get so much sun that the trail can get quickly overgrown. It could just be that the maintainer hadn't been able to make a work trip out there. Most of the trail is maintained by volunteers

To tie this back to the topic, being able to access the AT (or any trail) in walking distance of your house sounds great. Quick access, with no parking at trail heads and wondering if your car will get broken into or the catalytic converter will be cut off. But there are issues with being too close to the trail. Thru hikers usually aren't a problem, but weekend warrior camps can be very noisy, and house break-ins do happen. Some of it is theft, other times unprepared people might break in to get shelter from a storm. But it sounds like the place you (Andre) were looking at was probably far enough off the trail to avoid that.