A Walker in the Suburbs

A group of Thomas Jefferson magnet high school students have designed an app to help kids walk to school more safely. This after one of them tried running home from school and discovered himself on a busy road with no sidewalks in the dark.

Pedestrian safety — and lack thereof — is the ugly dark side of walking in the suburbs. Pedestrian fatalities shot up 72 percent between 2009 and 2024.

These young guys decided to do something about it. They worked on the app for months, creating an algorithm that takes safety and speed into account as well as other mapping data. Their app notes streets with sidewalks and crosswalks, for instance.

After winning a school competition, the SafeWalkr app was rolled out for (semi) public consumption. Fairfax County families who live within walking distance to 14 schools are giving it a try. If successful, it will be expanded to all county schools.

It can’t come soon enough.

(These walkers are in New York City, where crosswalks are more plentiful than in the suburbs.)

Yesterday’s walk was through the woods with two young hikers, ages 6 and 4. They could almost match their grandparents’ strides but they wanted to stop a lot, especially by the creek.

Our first stream bed foray was early on, when they begged to jump down and see the water. We complied, and found it dry enough to follow the bed for a few paces, dodging the few wet patches. We noted the bedrock and the roots of a giant oak, now exposed by erosion.

After finding a convenient way up to dry ground, we tramped along the path, looking for deer, which were strangely absent — probably at our house nibbling ground cover. The children waved their sticks and chatted so loudly that I’m sure all the forest animals were hiding, having heard us coming a mile away.

Our second dip down the creek’s bank came after we discovered a new plank bridge and tap-danced on it. This was a larger tributary, with plenty of water for stirring and even a sandy bottom, near where tadpoles swim in spring.

When we made the turn for home, their grandfather and I were more grateful than they were. Their energy seems unlimited, ours is not.

I can’t remember when it dawned on me that most people named Anne are not spring chickens. For a while “Anne” seemed to be the air I breathed. My grandmother was Ann — without an e, a travesty my mother corrected when she named me — and classmates (and their mothers) were also named Anne. It also made a handy middle name.

When I shared an apartment after college, it was with my friend Anne. We lived on the second floor of a house in Chicago’s Lincoln Park neighborhood. Below us lived another Ann, who said she didn’t need an “e” in her name. We pretended to be shocked by that, but of course did not believe her for a second. Every Anne needed an “e,” as far as we were concerned.

Funny … I didn’t intend this post to be about Annes, only about Lake Anne, which I walked around yesterday. It’s named for Reston founder Robert E. Simon’s then wife, Anne Wertheim Simon. She was a writer who penned articles for McCall’s, where I was an editor, and her sister was historian and author Barbara Tuchman.

Next time I walk around Lake Anne, I’ll be thinking about Anne Simon, the namesake of this charming body of water.

The light is fading but it’s primo walking weather. I’ve stepped out the last couple of days into low-humidity afternoons with the kind of blue skies that throw anything in front of them — roofs, tree tops, telephone poles — into high relief.

We have scant fall color here but the crispy, brown leaves that collect along the sides of the trail make the most delicious crunching sound when I tromp over them.

Mornings have been cool enough (the 40s!) that I’ve postponed outdoor activities till later in the day, which gives me time for “brain work” early. I’ve needed it.

And speaking of that, let the brain work proceed ….

(Footbridge in a brown wood.)

What to call a walk that becomes longer than you originally thought it would be? It seems like there should be a name for a stroll that becomes a hike, for an outing that takes on an extension, an add-on, a bonus.

The other day I hit the Glade Trail mid-afternoon, imagining it would be a simple out-and-back. But the air was pellucid and smelled of crushed leaves. The old body wasn’t as creaky as usual. I had nothing I had to do when I returned. So when I reached Twin Branches I knew I had to keep going, had to see the light sparkling on Lake Audubon.

Just an eighth turn around the lake, I told myself. But that was not enough. I kept going until I reached the big green dam and the steps up to the shady part of the trail I love best. After that, I knew I could sidle up to a neighborhood where I amble past houses and pretend I live in them. Couldn’t resist that.

By that point I was invested enough that I had to do the entire hour-and-a-half loop. It was more than I bargained for, but it was just right.

Yesterday’s walk took me through the woods to another street in the neighborhood, one I seldom visit. It held novelty and a sense of escape. It also held something I haven’t seen in a while: mud.

Though we’ve had rain through the warm months, we’ve been in drought conditions until recently. The water table has been low and the soil parched. Drops that fell were quickly absorbed. But now there’s a bit of water flowing through the creek and soggy patches on the trail.

I thought about wearing hiking boots, but since my walk was only partially in the woods, I decided against them. My tennis shoes would have to do. And they did. But not without detours. And tiptoeing. And searching for the high, dry ground.

A muddy trail is good for the earth, but it makes walking more complicated.

(A muddy trail in Bangladesh.)

I first heard the phrase “motion is lotion” from a physical therapist. I took to it right away. Movement matters. It can heal body, mind and spirit. The more you move, the more easily you move. I believe this. Most walkers do.

The expression pops into mind especially after a new exercise routine or enthusiastic weeding session leaves me stiff and sore. That was the case this morning, as I hobbled out of bed into my running tights and t-shirt to do the neighborhood loop with an ever-loosening gait.

My eyes have healed and I’ve no more excuses to skip the grunt work of exercising: the planks and poses that pit body weight against gravity. I went up against the weeds over the weekend, too. They have run rampant lately.

All of which means I needed the lotion that comes from motion. Come to think of it, I should get up and move a little more right now.

(Walkers in York, England, get some lotion from their motion.)

It was the most positive health story I’ve read in a long time, discussing a study in the July issue of Neurology which found that people who walk faster than their peers are less likely to experience cognitive decline.

Maybe this makes up for all the crossword puzzles I don’t work, all the chess I don’t play, and all the supplements I don’t take.

The study looked at 5,000 older people and builds on earlier research that studied folks in their 80s who walk at the speed of 50-year-olds. In short,”super movers” age more slowly. They’re healthier and more long-lived.

The article doesn’t discuss the sore muscles and creaky knees that can accompany a faster gait. Are these aches and pains a small price to pay? It depends on how bad one is hurting, I suppose.

But I know where I fall on the issue. I’ll keep walking as fast as I can, for as long as I can.

When I found myself with dilated eyes and time to kill before driving home, I did what all curious walkers do: explored the area. In this case, the area included one of the largest malls in the U.S. There was just one hitch: reaching the place on foot.

The Tysons Corner area is not pedestrian friendly. It may become more so in time — or at least that’s the hope. The Washington Metropolitan Transportation Authority (WMATA) put four stations in the Tysons area when it was routing the Silver Line in a bid to make the neighborhood more walkable. But it will take more than that, I’m afraid.

It will take more weirdos like me, people willing to stroll across 10 lanes of traffic on a broiling-hot afternoon. At least there was a crosswalk.

(This is not a pretty picture, but that’s the point.)

I’m just back from a Reston trails walk. It was good to have a change of scene after days of hoofing it through the neighborhood.

Not that I have anything against my neighborhood. It’s bucolic, as suburban subdivisions go, but it’s limited. I march up and down one major thoroughfare.

When I walk the Reston trails I meander along the Glade Creek, or circle Lake Newport. I cross bridges, trudge up hills and down. I explore any side trails that look appealing. A walk becomes an adventure.

Or least that’s the way it seems at the time. Maybe it’s just the walkers high.