Envisioning Murree a Walkable City

Abstract

The cities of the world have expanded with the modernization and development in transportation. Cities were small when people used to walk or use animals to move around. With the invention of motor cars the size of cities started to expand. After the inclusion of mass transit and freeways, the cities started to develop along major roads to form suburbs, thus further increasing the size of the cities. In present day, the dependence on automobiles is increasing and has become the main mode of transportation in many cities. It has resulted in the growth of cities in form of sprawling growth pattern and low-density developments which is causing transportation problems like congestion, delays, parking, overpricing etc. The conventional approach of transportation planning is mainly based on the provision of additional road infrastructure which is unsustainable as it generate more traffic. Moreover it is proved to be inefficient because high level of congestion persists in the city centers and major roads. In addition, planners and traffic engineers have realized that funds for the development and maintenance of highways and roads are not enough to cope with the growing traffic and congestion. Owing to the aforesaid reasons, planners were forced to review the conventional approach to solve transport issues. In doing so, planners shifted their focus to more sustainable transport systems, among which walkability is prominent which has recently become one of the main concerns for urban planners mainly due to the rapid changes in transport and town planning policies and practices. Besides this, walking is also a good way to promote the sustainability in a city. Measuring walkability is one of the main concern for many planners around the world. To measure walkability, multiple methods are used around the world; among which Walkability Indexes are the most appreciated, these include Global Walkability Index and Asia-Index. Each method has its own pros and cons. xvi Murree being a tourist town has different weather conditions and socio economic phenomenon as compared to rest of the country. Murree is also located in the midst of a forest where environment is deteriorating continuously; which needs to be protected. As vehicles are the major source of pollution, declining the use of vehicles can bring about a tremendous change in the city. The proposed plans of one way roads can be implemented for Murree to discourage vehicles by travelling long distances. Furthermore, promoting pedestrians by providing proper, wide and clean sidewalks and better facilities, Murree can be transformed into a Walkable City. From the study conducted, it can be concluded that Murree has such an environment which is walking friendly and it can be transformed in to a walkable city. As far as accessibility of different locations in Murree is concerned, results showed that whole city is accessible by walking. The results showed that most of the people can walk 2 km distance and analysis proved that from the center, whole city is accessible at 2km radius. Analysis also showed that from the edges of city, about 90% of major locations of Murree are accessible. The existing walking facilities in Murree are only at a satisfactory level. The major issues in this regard are the non-availability of sidewalks and non-provision of facilities for disables. Few road stretches in Murree are completely pedestrianized and having low vehicle count. Owing to these stretches, the overall conditions of walking facilities are satisfactory otherwise it is very difficult and unpleasant to walk in rest of the city. The study also concluded that the easiest and least costly methods to measure the walkability rating of an area are web based tools, among which WalkScore is the most prominent. WalkScore is dependent on the accessibility of land-uses rather than the facilities available for pedestrians. The calculated WalkScore of Murree city from Mall Road, which is the city center, is 53 out of 100. The other walkability indexes calculated after proper surveys, dependent on the xvii facilities for pedestrians, showed a slightly better condition. The original GWI for Murree is 74.60, ASIA Index is 59.52 and the new index named Local Index is 63.82. The ASIA Index and Local Index are out of 100 while GWI can go much higher than 100. In the end it is strongly recommended that walking should be promoted as the main mode of transport and structure plan of Murree should focus on pedestrian traffic to encourage walkable environment. Secondly, through facilities improvement along the main stretches of road in Murree, the value of walkability index can be improved from 80 to 100.