Your Home and Your Health
Categories: Green Home Blog, News & Updates
I came across this video recently via facebook. It’s an interesting explanation of something I think we all know: exercise is good for you. Even better, you don’t have to be a marathoner or triathlete to benefit from exercise.
Thirty minutes of daily exercise such as walking, running, swimming or biking (or others) is shown to significantly reduce hypertension, heart disease, obesity, depression, arthritis, and many other ailments. In many cases the risk of these conditions is reduced by over half with just 30 minutes a day of exercise.
How does your home affect your ability to exercise? Homes located in pedestrian friendly locations such as downtown Davidson encourage walking. There’s a neat website called WalkScore that shows the relative walkability of a home. Go to WalkScore and put in the address of the home we are building at 518 Walnut Street. You’ll see it is 74, which is considered Very Walkable. Use the map and the drop down boxes to see that there are 8 restaurants within a 3/4 mile walk of the home (among them the FlatIron Kitchen, Fuel Pizza, Restaurant X, the Brickhouse, Il Bosco, Campania Cafe, the Soda Shop and Toast), as well as several schools, parks, banks and other community resources.
Compare that to the WalkScore of a home in a popular subdivision on the east side of Davidson. It’s 3.
The difference in 74 and 3 is more than just 71; it’s your health. When you’re close to parks, restaurants, the Village Green, schools, shops and other community resources, you’re more likely to walk to them rather than take the car. This is good for your health, good for the environment, and good for your pocketbook as you’ll save on gas and doctor bills.
Check out Davidson Springs, our community of custom homes in the heart of downtown Davidson, North Carolina.