Running in the neighborhood

A few weeks ago I wrote about how I like our new place because it is so close to school and work. I was actually impressed with the little poll that I did with the post -- most people had a fairly manageable commute, with only two people reporting that their commute was more than 30 minutes. As we try to decide where we want to live after we graduate, that's a big factor for me. If I'm going to be working long hours (and I will), I might as well spend less time in the car.

The short commute isn't the only reason I like our new place, however. One hidden bonus has been the neighborhood. Our neighborhood is full of quiet, shady streets with pretty older homes and friendly people. In the evenings and in the morning there are always dozens of people walking, running, or biking around the neighborhood. This is a very pleasant change from our old place. We used to live in a gated community at the top of a very steep hill. No one walked anywhere because it was such a pain to go up and down that hill. In fact, no one at our old place went outside other than to go to their car. We lived there for more than two years and never met a single one of our neighbors until the day we moved out. It was a little late at that point.

The advantage of having a nice walking neighborhood is that I am much more inclined to exercise. At our old place I went running less than half a dozen times in two years. It was such a pain to have to run up the hill at the end, I spent most of my run just getting out of the apartment complex. Now I can wander in any direction, and each morning that I run I discover something new. One morning I found a new development and I checked out the homes as I ran by. Another morning I discovered a nice biking and walking path. Still another I found where the Nashville Ballet practices. I am constantly stumbling across nice little parks and playgrounds, and we've taken the Babe to a couple of them.

We didn't choose our apartment based on the walkabilitly of the neighborhood, but now that we're here, I think it's one of the best selling points. Our place is pretty small, so we won't live here forever. But when we move, I want to find another neighborhood that is nice to walk in. I even found a website called Walk Score that rates neighborhoods by how nice they are to walk in. If it gets me to exercise, it's definitely worth it.