Where Are All the Fantasy Pedestrians? Rethinking Walkability in Urban Worlds
Why do imaginary cities brim with life but real ones leave pedestrians behind? Explore the gap between fictional worlds and real urban walkability.
Stroll through any fantasy city depicted in books, films, or games and it’s likely you’ll encounter winding cobblestone streets, bustling marketplaces, and a tapestry of locals going about their business on foot. Yet, contrast these vibrant imaginary settings with the often desolate downtowns or suburban landscapes of the real world, and you’re faced with a curious question: Why do our fictional cities brim with pedestrian life while our real ones so frequently do not?
Imagined Cities, Always Walkable
From Middle-earth’s bustling town squares to Blade Runner’s neon-soaked urban canyons, works of fantasy and science fiction consistently craft walkable cities as the backdrop for adventure. These settings teem with shopkeepers, street vendors, townsfolk, and travelers—none in a hurry, many engaged in social exchange. These worlds seldom feature traffic or sprawling parking lots, and rarely does a protagonist hop in a car. Instead, the city is designed for those who travel on foot, living in close proximity to work, market, and home.
- Vibrant fantasy streets: Teeming with life, commerce, and public rituals.
- Short urban distances: Cities are compressed, encouraging walking and chance encounters.
- Pedestrian-oriented design: Imaginary metropolises rarely bother with traffic jams or parking dilemmas.
Ironically, these make-believe cities mirror walkable environments urban planners dream of but often fail to create in the real world.
Walkability: The Heartbeat of Urban Life
The presence of walkers in fantasy serves as more than backdrop—it signals a city’s health and humanity. In real cities, walkability encompasses far more than sidewalks; it touches everything from public safety to the intensity of social life. Urban design experts, such as those promoting the “General Theory of Walkability,” argue that for a city to draw walkers, four criteria must be met:
- Usefulness: Destinations for everyday needs must be close at hand.
- Safety: Streets must protect walkers from cars and create a sense of security.
- Comfort: Street design—trees, benches, appealing buildings—should invite lingering.
- Interest: Sidewalks should teem with varied, engaging sights, sounds, and social cues.
When cities fall short, space for public life shrinks, social isolation increases, and vitality ebbs from the streetscape. In fantasy, these core criteria are met as a matter of narrative necessity: the pedestrian is central to the unfolding of the story. In reality, neglecting walkability means neglecting the human heart of the city.
Why Are Real Cities Missing Their Walkers?
If even our wildest fantasies hinge on walkable urban spaces, why do so many actual cities seem designed to exclude pedestrians? Examining the built environment reveals several key causes:
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- Car-centric planning: Post-WWII priorities shifted from compact, mixed-use neighborhoods to sprawling suburbs, dividing residential and commercial zones and often making walking impractical.
- Street hierarchy and zoning laws: Modern codes separate workplaces, stores, and homes, requiring travel by car over long distances.
- Wide roads and scarce crossings: Many intersections are designed for speed and volume, not for human-scale travel, putting walkers at risk and making journeys unpleasant.
- Lack of pedestrian amenities: Absence of shade, benches, or continuous sidewalks further discourages walking, especially for vulnerable groups like seniors or children.
- Institutional inertia and special interests: Sometimes, policies are shaped by lobbies (such as fire departments or commercial interests), resulting in overly wide streets and environments hostile to foot traffic.
In effect, the very features creating vibrancy and safety in fictional cities—mixed-use hubs, human-scale streetscapes, omnipresent foot traffic—are often intentionally designed out of their real-world counterparts.
The Social and Environmental Losses
Neglecting walkability is not just an issue of convenience. It brings measurable harm:
- Public health: Reduced physical activity correlates with obesity, diabetes, and numerous chronic illnesses.
- Social isolation: Pedestrian-free streets decrease spontaneous encounters and undermine community bonds.
- Environmental damage: Car dependency swells carbon emissions and air pollution.
- Inequity: Those unable to drive—children, elderly, disabled—lose freedom and opportunity.
Cities filled with cars rather than people sever the connection between neighbors, stifle commerce for small local businesses, and make daily life riskier for anyone daring to walk.
Design Lessons from Imaginary Worlds
Fantasy city depictions rarely dwell on the mechanics—they simply deliver walkability as an ambient fact. But if we treat these depictions as a kind of urban wish-fulfillment, they offer several practical design lessons for reality:
- Embrace density and mixed use: Merge homes, shops, schools, and parks to shorten trips on foot.
- Prioritize human scale: Design streets for people before vehicles, with narrow crossings, quality surfaces, and universal accessibility.
- Encourage street life: Incentivize outdoor seating, regular markets, street festivals, and public art.
- Create visual interest: Vary building facades, support unique storefronts, and invest in landscaping.
- Engineer for safety: Traffic calming, protected crossings, and speed management help walkers feel secure.
- Universal design: Ensure all ages and abilities are considered in every element of street and public realm planning.
Where these practices are adopted, the result is a city that looks far more like the fictional environments we so often romanticize—a place that feels alive and inviting at all hours.
Barriers to Pedestrian Utopia
Unlocking a pedestrian paradise in reality runs up against substantial barriers:
- Institutional fragmentation: Competing jurisdictions—fire codes, zoning boards, traffic engineers—often work at cross-purposes.
- Resistance from drivers: Road space repurposing (e.g., lanes to bike or footpaths) often faces pushback from motorists fearful of congestion.
- Short-term thinking: Elected officials may prioritize quick fixes or visual improvements over systemic, long-horizon change.
- Inertia and habit: Decades of auto dependency have shaped both policies and expectations, making transformation seem daunting.
Nonetheless, examples from around the world—including cities like Paris, Amsterdam, and Barcelona—show that with intent and policy commitment, even the most vehicle-dominated streets can welcome back the walker.
Populating the Imagination: Why Pedestrian Fiction Matters
There’s a reason novelists, filmmakers, and game designers continue to set their grandest dramas amid throngs of walkers. The crowded street offers atmosphere, narrative richness, and a sense of shared humanity. It’s hard to imagine epic adventures unfolding in empty parking lots or on suburban cul-de-sacs.
This imaginative preference reflects an instinct that crowded spaces are more than just pretty—they embody opportunity, safety, and community. In sum, our creative works call us to reimagine our own cities—not just for atmosphere, but for the fundamental human need to connect.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Why do fantasy cities always seem so walkable?
Fantasy and sci-fi creators design cities for drama and interaction, often reflecting historic urban models where people lived, worked, and socialized within walking distance. This pedestrian vibrancy helps build world depth and foster character relationships.
What are the essential elements of walkable real-world cities?
Walkable real cities offer mixed land use, compact neighborhoods, pedestrian-priority design, safety features (like traffic calming), and ample public space for social exchange, all scaffolded by accessible infrastructure for all ages and abilities.
Why did modern urban planning often neglect pedestrians?
Postwar planning in many countries prioritized speed and car convenience, separating land uses and designing streets for maximum vehicle throughput. Institutional pressures, zoning codes, and inertia reinforced this shift, eroding pedestrian-friendly patterns.
Can car-heavy cities become more walkable?
Yes, through policies such as road diets, expanded sidewalks, enforcing lower speed limits, planting street trees, and incentivizing mixed-use development, cities can gradually reclaim space for walkers, though progress may involve overcoming political and cultural resistance.
Does improving walkability help everyone equally?
Improvements benefit all, but are especially vital for people without access to cars—children, seniors, those with disabilities—and for creating lively, inclusive public spaces. Equitable planning considers the varied needs and experiences of all city residents.
Table: Contrasting Fantasy and Real-World Urban Environments
| Aspect | Fantasy/Sci-Fi City | Typical Real City |
|---|---|---|
| Street Activity | Always busy; pedestrians abound; many social interactions | Pedestrian traffic often low except in select locations or events |
| Urban Design | Dense, mixed use; destinations are close by | Often segregated uses, sprawling and auto-dependent |
| Public Spaces | Central gathering places, markets, plazas | Spaces often sacrificed to cars, parking lots, or vacant |
| Pedestrian Safety | Implied as high; few cars depicted | Real threats from traffic, wide roads, and fast vehicles |
| Sense of Community | Vibrant, interconnected urban life | Potential for isolation amid car-centric environments |
Moving Forward: Reclaiming the Streets for People
As our societies face public health crises, climate change, and growing loneliness, the absence of pedestrians is not a trivial matter but a threat to urban resilience and joy. The lesson from fantasy is that we already know what kinds of cities we want—it’s time to use policy and design to bring them into being.
- Update zoning and building codes to encourage mixed-use and dense development.
- Invest in comprehensive pedestrian infrastructure: sidewalks, crossings, benches, lighting, universal design.
- Prioritize public space as essential to civic and community life, not a luxury or afterthought.
- Slow traffic and reclaim road space for social and non-motorized travel.
- Invite all citizens into the design process, ensuring that cities serve everyone, not just the able-bodied or car owners.
The thriving, walkable, human-scaled cities of our collective imagination are possible. They need only the will to defy car dominance and center human presence once again—so that the pedestrians return, not just in fantasy, but in every real-world street.
References
- https://www.petkovstudio.com/bg/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Walkable-City.pdf
- https://lloydalter.substack.com/p/bonus-its-time-to-take-back-the-streets
- https://dspace.mit.edu/bitstream/handle/1721.1/152471/strauss-istrauss-mcp-dusp-2023-thesis.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y
- https://scholarship.law.wm.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1745&context=wmelpr
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