Sustainability
Wellness

We want to inspire your legs.

“Can a ten-year-old on a bike get from home to school, to the park and to the store?” That’s the top criteria for a well-designed community according to renowned urban planner Peter Calthorpe. A walkable community is a more convenient community, where things like schools and parks and maybe your office are closer to your home. It’s also a healthier community, where more people spend more time walking or biking and less time stressed out in traffic.

Peter Calthorpe created the overall plan for Mesa del Sol. And he’ll tell you that while the idea of a walkable community is simple, actually creating such a community is not. Here are some of the design features that will allow people to walk and bike in Mesa del Sol … and may actually inspire them to do so:

MIXED-USE
STREET GRID
PEDESTRIAN-FRIENDLY
DIVERSE
TRAILS

Mixed Use.

This means mixing together homes, parks, schools, offices, shops and restaurants in such a way that they’re all closer to each other.
Modified Street Grid.

The typical planned community has lots of cul de sacs — i.e. dead ends — and big, scary collector roads. This type of street layout makes walking difficult and unenjoyable. The plan for Mesa del Sol uses a modified street grid in which almost all of the thoroughfares are through streets. Street grids let pedestrians and drivers choose the quickest route from one place to another. They also tend to distribute traffic more evenly throughout the community, minimizing the need for high-traffic collector streets.
Pedestrian-Friendly Street Design.

Wider sidewalks let people walk comfortable side-by-side. Narrower streets encourage slower driving. Put them together, and you have streets that encourage more walking.
DIVERSE, AUTHENTIC ARCHITECTURE

It’s more fun to walk if you can look at a colorful variety of homes along the way.
Trail Network.

Not only will Mesa del Sol be criss-crossed by a system of trails and sidewalks, many of these paths will take walkers and bikers through beautiful open spaces, both natural and landscaped.