walkON – building environments that support walking for active transportation

walkON logo

What is walkON?

  • walkON is a community partnership that engages the community, municipal staff, and elected officials in the creation of built environments that support walking for active transportation.
  •   Program goals:
    • Educate the community-at-large
    • Support community action

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Who is walkON?

  • walkON is a program that began as a Central West Ontario Heart Health project in:
    • Brant
    • Haldimand-Norfolk
    • Halton
    • Niagara
    • Wellington-Dufferin-Guelph
    • Waterloo
  • Coordinators from each of these health units continue to work together on Central West regional work.
  • In Halton, the walkON program is supported by the Halton Region Health Department and it is delivered in partnership with community groups.
  • Due to the success of the program, Green Communities Canada in partnership with 8-80 Cities, is currently expanding the walkON program across the province

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What is a walkable community?

  • A walkable community has a built environment that supports walking, biking and using public transit for active transportation. Such a built environment is well designed and compact to allow people to choose to walk to school, work, parks, and restaurants as a form of everyday transportation.
  • The built environment includes all the buildings, spaces and products that are created, or changed by people, such as:
    • our homes
    • schools
    • workplaces
    • parks
    • business areas
    • roads
  • A walkable community is addresses these components:
    • Density – homes, workplaces and other activities, when close enough together make walking distances shorter and support public transit and retail
    • Diverse Uses (or Access to Amenities) – having a variety of places to walk to within a 5-10 minute walk or a short bike ride.
    • Design:
      • Connectivity – sidewalks, pathways and trails connect you to where you want to go
      • Aesthetics – having interesting and pleasant things to look at creates an enjoyable walking environment
      • Safety – communities are designed to make you feel safe and reduce pedestrian injuries

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What can I do to make my community more walkable?

  • Check out the " What can I do   External Link " web page on iCANwalk's website to see what more you can do.

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International Charter for Walking

The International Charter for Walking External Link is focused on creating healthy, efficient and sustainable communities where people choose to walk. The International Charter was first introduced in 1999. Since then, many communities around the world have adopting walking or pedestrian charters to support their initiatives and policies and encourage walking.

Active Halton (formerly the Halton Active Living Network – HALNet) together with the 4 Halton municipalities and the Region of Halton determined that a Pedestrian Charter for Halton should be best established at the local level. 

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Additional Resources

Over the past year, the Halton Region Health Department has partnered with community organizations to host a series of walkability workshops. The reports below:

  • summarize the workshops held in Georgetown, Acton and Burlington
  • describe opportunities and challenges for making active transportation better
  • conclude with the top priorities for action and some resources

The reports will assist stakeholders, including municipal decision makers, in determining priority physical improvements, and in implementing the changes through planning, fund raising and budgeting.

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Halton Region is composed of the City of Burlington, the Town of Halton Hills, the Town of Milton, and the Town of Oakville .