Walk this Way is a new app from the Monash University Accident Research Centre (MUARC) which is designed to help parents and kids find the safest routes to school while travelling on foot. Unfortunately, it’s currently only available to hip kids with iPhones, iPads and iPod Touches.
School crossing picture from Shutterstock
The Walk this Way app was designed for parents and schools to identify the best walking routes to school for children. It uses MUARC’s existing star-rating system in conjunction with Google maps to provide a snapshot of the safest pedestrian routes available.
Users are provided with star ratings for crossing locations based on speed limit, crossing facilities, the number of traffic directions, traffic volume and the number of lanes. You can also add your own personal ratings to the mix.
“In its current form, the model can be used to assign star ratings to each of the road crossing points along a proposed or existing walking route in order to identify crossing points with a low star rating that should receive priority attention,” MUARC researcher Dr David Logan said.
“This information can be used to guide the responsible agencies in identifying opportunities for raising safety to levels that are acceptable or to find a different route. The goal should be to have all crossing points achieving four or five stars.”
It is also hoped that the app will encourage more children to walk to school in a bid to curb the nation’s increasing obesity problem.
The pilot app was recently trialed across four Victorian primary schools and has now made its way to the Apple Store for iPhone, iPad or iPod touch.
Unfortunately, there’s currently no word on an Android or Windows Phone version which means non-iOS users have been quite literally thrown under the bus (we’re joking of course).
We contacted the MUARC and asked whether there were any plans to bring the app to other devices. We’ll update the story as soon as we get a response.
See also: Which State Is Australia’s Fattest? | Why Are People So Bad At School Parking? | What’s The Most Inappropriate Gadget You Use While Walking?
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