Metrotown residents are less likely to be overweight because they live in a “walker’s paradise,” according to a new study that links walkability and obesity risk.
The research, a collaboration between the Fraser Health Authority, Vancouver Coastal Health and UBC, was presented at the World Diabetes Congress in Vancouver last week.
It found people who live in neighbourhoods where daily errands can be done on foot are 31 per cent less likely to be obese or overweight than people living in areas where a car is needed to run most errands.
Burnaby has one such “walker’s paradise,” stretching along Kingsway by Metrotown, with the intersection of Kingsway and Willingdon Avenue at its heart.
Walkability in the area is rated 90 or above, according Walk Score, a website that measures walkability on a scale from 0 to 100 based on walking routes to destinations like grocery stores, schools, parks, restaurants and retail.
The rest of the Burnaby stretch of Kingsway is considered “very walkable” (with scores between 70 and 89), as are Burnaby’s other official town centres: Lougheed, Brentwood and Edmonds.
Other “very walkable” areas include the Heights, Lochdale (south of Hastings) and Cascade-Schou (south of Highway 1 along Boundary Road).
People living in “very walkable” areas are 11 per cent less likely to be obese or overweight, according the recent study, which combined the Walk Score data with data from My Health, My Community, an online Metro Vancouver survey conducted in 2013-14.
“We found that living in walkable areas was associated with significantly lower odds of being obese or overweight,” said Salman Klar, the Fraser Health researcher working on the study. “Risk of obesity and diabetes are increasingly attributed to environmental factors; however, limited attention has been paid to the impact of physical features of a neighbourhood.”
Obesity is a major modifiable risk factor for type 2 diabetes.
“Somewhat walkable” neighbourhoods, with walkability scores between 50 and 69, were not significantly different from the most car-dependent areas of the city when it came to their residents’ obesity risk, the study found.
