In honor of Bike to Work Day, we pulled together a list of America's most bike-friendly neighborhoods. The neighborhood rankings below are based on the latest neighborhood-level data provided to us by the folks at Walk Score (Walk Score measures walkability, Bike Score measures bikeability).
Bike Score places neighborhoods and cities into four categories based on a 100-point score (ranked on bike lanes, hills, destinations and road connectivity, and bike commuting mode share): Biker's Paradise (90-10), Very Bikeable (70-89), Bikeable (50-69), and Somewhat Bikeable (0-49). The data here cover more than 7,000 neighborhoods across the United States. The table below shows America's 25 most bikeable neighborhoods.
Top 25 Neighborhoods by Bike Score
Rank
Neighborhood
City
Bike Score
Population
1
Old North Davis
Davis, CA
100.0
424
1
Parkside Resident
Madison, WI
100.0
14
1
Old East Davis
Davis, CA
100.0
583
1
Downtown Core
Davis, CA
100.0
420
5
Goss Grove
Boulder, CO
100.0
1,689
6
South Eugene High School
Eugene, OR
100.0
660
7
West University
Eugene, OR
99.9
6,548
8
University Avenue
Davis, CA
99.8
483
9
Pie Allen
Tucson, AZ
99.8
957
10
Midtown/Winn Park Capitol Avenue
Sacramento, CA
99.8
6,268
11
University Heights
Albuquerque, NM
99.7
2,401
12
Marshall School
Sacramento, CA
99.7
2,217
13
Newton Booth
Sacramento, CA
99.7
2,750
14
Interland/University Research Park
Davis, CA
99.7
408
15
Brittingham Apartments
Madison, WI
99.6
86
16
Jefferson Westside
Eugene, OR
99.5
6,471
17
University of Oregon Campus
Eugene, OR
99.5
3,024
18
Iron Horse
Tucson, AZ
99.4
549
19
Boulevard Park
Sacramento, CA
99.4
2,893
20
New Era Park
Sacramento, CA
99.3
1,673
21
Cambridgeport
Cambridge, MA
99.3
12,101
22
Armory Park
Tucson, AZ
99.2
1,632
23
Alhambra Triangle
Sacramento, CA
99.2
387
24
Richmond Grove
Sacramento, CA
99.1
1,986
25
Bayview Foundation Inc.
Madison, WI
99.1
150
Data courtesy of Walk Score
Six neighborhoods have perfect scores: three in Davis, California, and one each in Madison, Wisconsin; Boulder, Colorado and Eugene, Oregon. Multiple cities have several neighborhoods among the top 25. Davis, California has five; neighboring Sacramento has seven; Eugene has four; and Madison has three. Aside from Madison and Cambridge, all of the top 25 are located in the Western part of the United States. Many of the top neighborhoods are located in college towns.
We can also use these neighborhood data to rank the cities with the most bikeable neighborhoods. The map below by our trusty cartographer, Zara Matheson of the Martin Prosperity Institute, plots the two highest bike score categories for 66 cities. The size of the dot shows the number of neighborhoods in that city that have a score of at least 70. The pink pie slice indicates the share of those neighborhoods that score at 90 or above, or Biker's Paradise.
The top-rated city overall is Tucson, with 89 neighborhoods that score 70 or higher, and Minneapolis and Portland tie for second with 61. Albuquerque and Chicago each have 60. Boulder, Sacramento, Davis, New York, and Denver round out the top 10. The rest of the top 20 include: Tempe, Oakland, Madison, San Francisco, Washington, D.C., Seattle, Philadelphia, Arlington, Austin, and New Orleans.
When it comes to just the top-ranked category, Tucson tops the list again with 32 Biker's Paradise neighborhoods. Boulder is second with 22, and Davis is third with 17. Madison and Sacramento tie for fourth with 16 each. Minneapolis has 15, Albuquerque has 14, Denver and Portland each have 12, and Tempe rounds out the top 10 with 10. Cambridge, Eugene, and Philadelphia each have eight. San Francisco has seven, D.C. has five, and New Orleans has four. Lincoln, Nebraska, Missoula, Montana, and St. Petersburg, Florida have three each, and both Boise, Idaho and Oakland have two. Boston, Irvine, Pasadena, Salt Lake City, and Seattle each have one neighborhood that ranks in the highest category.
Still, it's abundantly clear that America still has a long way to go on bike friendliness (see the table below).
Distribution of Neighborhoods by Bike Score
Bike Score
Number of Neighborhoods
Percent of Total
90-100: Biker's Paradise
224
3.2 percent
70-89: Very Bikeable
1021
14.6 percent
50-69: Bikeable
2225
31.7 percent
0-49: Somewhat Bikeable
3546
50.5 percent
Data courtesy of Walk Score
More than eight in 10 neighborhoods across the United States fall into the two least bikeable categories. And more than half of them — 3500 plus — are concentrated in very bottom category. Conversely, just 3.2 percent of the neighborhoods make the top-ranked category, Biker's Paradise, while another 14.6 percent can be considered Very Bikeable.
That's something mayors, transportation planners, and all of us need to think about on this Bike to Work Day.
Top image: Commuters park their bikes before taking advantage of a free breakfast provided for cyclists. (Tim Wimborne/Reuters)
Richard Florida is a co-founder and editor at large of CityLab and a senior editor at The Atlantic. He is a university professor in the University of Toronto’s School of Cities and Rotman School of Management, and a distinguished fellow at New York University’s Schack Institute of Real Estate.
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