WAGIS2019

Natural beauty and outdoor opportunities are two of the defining characteristics of the Puget Sound region. From hundreds of miles of trails to scenic park land to play areas in neighborhood parks, there are opportunities to match a wide variety of outdoor recreational desires. Access to nearby nature should be available across the region, yet almost 25% of King County residents are unable to enjoy the numerous benefits associated with easy access to parks and open space. As the region’s population grows by 50 people per day, public land becomes increasingly scarce, which restricts access to those with money and resources to get there. Our talk will explain how we worked with The Wilderness Society’s Urban to Wild program to combine data from the US Census, King County, PSRC, and other sources to measure walking access to parks, transit access to parks, park pressure, and a number of other factors across a variety of sociodemographic characteristics. We will explain how to use the GTFS and Better Bus Buffers analysis tools in ArcMap, how to extract relevant data from the American Communities Survey, and explain how our findings can help policy makers increase accessibility to outdoor recreation opportunities throughout the County.