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Musing while in bed, I took the known size of the house I'm in, guessed at the lot size, and then -- taking it as average -- at Albany's population density. I was around 4000-ish people/km2, and Wikipedia says 4300. Not a bad guess!
Some years ago, I made a couple of posts about 3000 people/km2 perhaps being the minimum needed for walkability, based on having enough people in walking distance to support a supermarket. So 4300 should be better, yes? And it probably is, though of course going from a town-wide average to my local area is risky. (Then again, the town only has 20,000 people, it doesn't have that much room for variation.) While I still compare it unfavorably to Mexico City, the walkability is at least a cut above 'minimal'. Some of that is businesses 'subsidized' by driving customers -- San Pablo wants to be a stroad when it grows up -- but Solano is fairly "Main Street", with shops on the sidewalk and little parking. (These are the main commercial streets near me.)
I realized that by some fluke, there are actually seven grocery stores within a 15 minute walk, which is rather absurd even by my standards. Safeway and Andronico's (private store but pretty big) on Solano; Whole Foods, Tokyo Fish Market, and Sprouts (WF-like for people who don't want to shop at WF?) on or just off of San Pablo; then a natural food store and an Asian produce-heavy market in two different micro-clusters (10 shops or fewer in a residential area.) 3 of those are technically in Berkeley, but the urban fabric is pretty similar. Some of those have specializations but they all sell a variety of fresh produce and raw meat (probably mostly frozen for the natural food store).
Some years ago, I made a couple of posts about 3000 people/km2 perhaps being the minimum needed for walkability, based on having enough people in walking distance to support a supermarket. So 4300 should be better, yes? And it probably is, though of course going from a town-wide average to my local area is risky. (Then again, the town only has 20,000 people, it doesn't have that much room for variation.) While I still compare it unfavorably to Mexico City, the walkability is at least a cut above 'minimal'. Some of that is businesses 'subsidized' by driving customers -- San Pablo wants to be a stroad when it grows up -- but Solano is fairly "Main Street", with shops on the sidewalk and little parking. (These are the main commercial streets near me.)
I realized that by some fluke, there are actually seven grocery stores within a 15 minute walk, which is rather absurd even by my standards. Safeway and Andronico's (private store but pretty big) on Solano; Whole Foods, Tokyo Fish Market, and Sprouts (WF-like for people who don't want to shop at WF?) on or just off of San Pablo; then a natural food store and an Asian produce-heavy market in two different micro-clusters (10 shops or fewer in a residential area.) 3 of those are technically in Berkeley, but the urban fabric is pretty similar. Some of those have specializations but they all sell a variety of fresh produce and raw meat (probably mostly frozen for the natural food store).