How walkable is your neighborhood?

How walkable is my community?

I'm so glad you asked.

Thanks to a tip from the Metropolitan Planning Council, I've been clicking away on a Web site called "Walk Score." It rates neighborhoods on their walkability using a scale of 1 to 100.

Although you'd think walkability means picturesque greenery, that's not exactly what the Web site's creators intended. As Walk Score explains it, in a walkable neighborhood, "you lose weight each time you walk to the grocery store. You stumble home from last call without waiting for a cab. You spend less money on your car - or you don't own a car. You talk to your neighbors."

According to Walk Score, this utopia must have a center whether it's a shopping area or a main street, public transit nearby, local businesses, mixed income housing, parks, schools and workplaces. Streets should include bicycle lanes and sidewalks.

The Web site calculates your walkability score by awarding points for the proximity of various amenities.

Of course, I was sure my neighborhood would do well. It's near Good Samaritan Hospital in Downers Grove, close to schools, shopping and parks.

I punched in our address, and waited eagerly as a map and a list of local attractions emerged on the screen. But Walk Score was unimpressed. We rated a 55 out of 100, or "somewhat walkable."

For the next hour, I bugged colleagues for their addresses. Here's a snapshot of the results.

• Downtown Mount Prospect. Score: 80 Very walkable

• West Wheeling. Score: 25 Car-dependent

• Old Irving Park neighborhood in Chicago. Score: 72 Very walkable

• Northwest Lisle. Score: 56 Somewhat walkable

You may not agree with the ratings, but it's worth a cyber visit at www.walkscore.com.

Heed this warning

It was Friday and I was early for a Metra meeting downtown. It was all good. There was a coffee shop nearby and a bunch of empty parking spots on Jefferson Street. So why not save the company money instead of using a lot?

Like an idiot, I cruised into the space, fed the meter and headed up to the meeting. Nearly two hours and lots of statistics later, I ran out to add quarters. No car.

And why, why was my faithful Honda Civic gone? Every Friday from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m., it's street cleaning time, mocked a sign I hadn't noticed before.

I'll fast forward through the call to 311 and the confirmation from the Chicago auto pound that, yes, they had my Civic.

What followed was a Dante-esque trek through the dreary inferno that is Lower East Wacker Drive past the bizarre (mutant pigeons) and the poignant (a homeless man under tattered blankets). While every other facility such as hotel parking has clear signs, the city's auto pound seems deliberately obscure. Thanks to a kindly construction worker, I finally arrived at 400 E. Wacker, to a Kremlim-like atmosphere.

The woman behind a glass window silently pointed me to a joyless man filling out forms. Other car-deprived souls waited at the counter, watching miserably as a video played pictures of violation signs.

"You have to have cash," the joyless one told a woman.

"I knew it," she said, on the verge of tears.

After half an hour and $160 later, I anxiously searched the lot. One forlorn BMW's lights kept flashing as if to say, "how could you do this to me?"

On the Civic's window was another blow. A $50 ticket. Maybe I can expense it.

Lesson learned: If that street parking looks too good to be true - it probably is.

It's an Illinois thing

It was an intense EJ&E week in the region, with the Surface Transportation Board finishing up public meetings on a proposed merger between Canadian National Railway and the smaller "J." Related to the EJ&E controversy, the U.S. House Transportation Committee held a hearing Tuesday on a bill seeking to change the STB's mandate by requiring regulators to give greater priority to communities' concerns.

All heavy stuff, although a lighter moment was provided when Committee Chairman James Oberstar asked state Rep. Elaine Nekritz if Illinois lawmakers would be willing to commit millions of dollars toward train traffic mitigation if the federal government offered matching funds.

"Is the Illinois legislature of a mind to move such legislation?" the Minnesota Democrat asked.

I felt bad for Nekritz. How do you explain the state's current political dysfunction to a non-Illinoisan?

Do you start with Gov. Rod Blagojevich's feud with fellow Democrats? Give a lecture on past budget doomsdays? Go right to the current capital budget crisis? Outline the plan to sell the lottery to pay for capital projects in the Illinois House? Then explain it may not pass the Senate? Or just pretend Oberstar was joking and laugh uproariously?

There was a tiny pause, then, "I hesitate to get into the mind of our legislature right now. It's a very trying time in Illinois politics," said Nekritz, a Northbrook Democrat.

Flotsam and jetsam

• Parents who are always saying, "stop playing on that runway!" will have to change their tone next weekend. The city of Chicago hosts a Community Day from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Sept. 21 at O'Hare International Airport to celebrate the official opening of the new north runway later that week.

There's entertainment, food vendors, a kids fun run, and a 5K Run/Walk. Free parking is provided at the airport's Lot G. For more information, go to www.OhareModernization.org.

• If you'd planned to take the CTA's Blue Line into Chicago today, be prepared to hop on the bus between Jefferson Park and Irving Park stations. Construction crews will be working on slow zones in that section.

• Feeling crowded on Metra lately? Well, the railway will add some extra cars although they're not gold-plated. Metra Executive Director Phil Pagano said Friday the agency tracked down some old cars it passed on to Utah when the state hosted the Olympics in 2002. How much did Metra pay to get the cars back? About $1 each, Pagano said.

• Thanks to an astute reader who also is a United pilot for pointing out the airline does not own United Express as I wrote last week in an item about passengers denied a bathroom break. So what is the relationship between the two companies? United contracts with regional carriers to operate the United Express brand, according to the airline.