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CTwalk Map

  • Nov 12
  • 2 min read
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CTwalk Map maps 5- and 15-minute walkability, showing how different age groups can reach city destinations and highlighting local access inequalities.


Purpose of Tool:

CTwalk Map is an interactive web-tool which uses open-source pedestrian street-network, population-demographic and place/amenity data to map and visualise the 5- and 15-minute walking environment in cities. It estimates ➤ how many children, adults and elderly citizens can reach various destinations on foot within short walking journeys; ➤ the extent of pedestrian co-accessibility (i.e., whether people of different age groups share access to the same destinations) and thus reveals local access inequities and the social-cohesion potential of neighbourhoods. miliasv.github.io+1

In the Equal-Life context this tool can help operationalise built-environment exposure modelling for children’s (and other age groups’) development by quantifying walkable accessibility and age-diversity of access to amenities, which ties into the physical exposome, urban form, mobility and social-cohesion dimensions.


Classification of tool:

Model / analytical tool / interactive geospatial assessment tool.


Required skills:

  • Python (for preprocessing, network construction, walkshed computation)

  • GIS/geospatial analysis (street-network graphs, spatial origin–destination mapping)

  • Familiarity with open data sources (e.g., OpenStreetMap, national statistics grids) and urban accessibility concepts.


Required input data:

  • Pedestrian (walkable) street-network data (e.g., extracted via OSMnx from OSM) miliasv.github.io

  • Population demographic data at fine spatial resolution (e.g., 100 × 100 m grid with age groups) miliasv.github.io

  • Places/amenities (destination locations) data (e.g., from OSM, representing “third places” where people of different ages meet) miliasv.github.io

  • Parameters for walk-time bounds (e.g., 5-minute, 15-minute walks) and average walking speed (used to delineate walksheds) miliasv.github.io


Output:

  • Interactive map visuals (layers for walksheds, population blocks, destinations) showing:

    • For each origin (housing block): how many amenities are reachable within X-minutes walk. miliasv.github.io

    • For each destination: how many people (and from which age groups) can access it within X-minutes walk; age-diversity metric (Shannon’s Equitability Index) of the reachable population. miliasv.github.io+1

  • Spatial data (geodataframes / maps) classifying places by low/average/high age-diversity of reach, and coloured housing blocks by number of accessible places.

  • An indicator set that quantifies pedestrian walkability, accessibility equity, and social-cohesion potential in neighbourhoods.


Relation to other tools:

  • It complements other built‐environment exposure tools (e.g., network centrality or connectivity tools) by focusing specifically on walkability, access and co-accessibility across age groups.

  • It can feed into broader exposure and health-outcome modelling (the “external / physical exposome” WP) by providing quantitative spatial metrics of pedestrian accessibility and age-diversity of access—it thus serves as a bridge between raw geospatial data (street networks, demographics) and exposure indicators.

  • It aligns with the platform’s aims for open-source tools and actionable indicators for policy/urban-planning use: urban planners or public-health analysts within Equal-Life can use CTwalk Map outputs to identify neighbourhoods with low accessibility or low age-diversity of access (which might correlate with weaker social-cohesion or fewer childhood development opportunities).

  • It interconnects with data-enrichment and integration tools: the outputs from CTwalk Map could be integrated with other exposome layers (e.g., green space access, noise exposure, social-exposome metrics) in multi-exposure modelling frameworks.


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