Walkable Neighborhoods for Seniors: The Alameda County experience

The Walkable Neighborhoods for Seniors (WN4S) project was designed to develop and promote safe and accessible neighborhood walking routes for seniors. This article describes a case study of the efforts put forth by one local lead agency - United Seniors of Oakland and Alameda County (USOAC). To facilitate environmental and policy changes that would enable and encourage walking by older adults, USOAC implemented several strategies including organizing a local task force with broad professional representation, conducting environmental audits of selected walking routes, creating walking groups, organizing an annual healthy living festival, collaborating with public health marketing and community livability initiatives, and advocating for environmental and policy change. Evaluation processes yielded information indicating a variety of successes, challenges, and lessons learned that could be applied to similar WN4S efforts undertaken by community organizations to increase the physical activity and improve the health and independence of older adults.