Walkable   Neighborhoods

The green dots represent locally-owned bakeries in Paris; 94% of Parisians have at least one bakery within a 5-minute walk.

When I lived in Barcelona, there were 4 local bakeries on my block. I knew who baked my bread; they knew who ate their bread. They were proud of their product. There was meaning in their work. We were interdependent. We were important to each other. We took care of each other. We promoted each others' mental-emotional health.

In our auto-centric development pattern, convenience and the lowest price are all that matters. We don't know who bakes our bread, and they don't know us. We don't know who sells us our bread, and they don't know us. We have no connection, no interdependence. There is no meaning in their work.
In our auto-centric development, we don't meet each other; we are isolated in our cars. We create no weak connections to people; we have no strong connection to place. Dane County looks like every other county in the country. Madison or Macon, it doesn't really matter.

In our cars, we compete, yelling at other drivers, sneaking through yellow lights. We  destroy our mental-emotional health and the health of others.

Please demand that your local leaders follow a walkable model when developing new housing/commercial centers. For our collective mental-emotional health and sense of place.