When choosing a holiday destination, holidaymakers will be considering how easy their choice is to navigate – with how walkable a city is being a top priority for many.
But choosing a destination with easy-to-walk streets and simple routes to see all the main attractions is important – and there are two location in particular that have been crowned the best.
Europe’s most walkable city has been revealed – and an Italian gem tops the list, alongside a Portuguese destination.
Milan and Porto were crowned the most walkable cities in the study, with a score of 9.9 out of 10.
The research found that Milan, Italy, is Europe’s joint first most walkable city – and walking between Milan’s five most popular attractions takes 34 minutes, with a total elevation gain of only 11 metres, making it a largely flat and highly walkable route.
Beginning at the Il Cenacolo, home to Leonardo da Vinci’s The Last Supper, the route continues through the historic Castello Sforzesco, built between 1360 and 1370.
From here, it passes Duomo di Milano, the city’s iconic Gothic cathedral and second largest cathedral in the world, before reaching the elegant Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II, the 19th century shopping arcade, home to luxurious boutiques. The route concludes at the canal district of I Navigli.
Plus, flights to Milan start from just £28 with Ryanair.
Milan – the Italian fashion capital and a real gem – tops the list in joint first place
Also in joint first place is Porto, Portugal.
Here, the journey to each of the top five attractions is slightly less than Milan.
It totals just 1.9 kilometres (30 minutes), but with higher elevation gain (25m), Porto also scored 9.9/10.
Four spots came in next – all taking joint-second place, with a score of 9.8: Athens, Copenhagen, Bergamo, Italy, and Antwerp, Belgium.
Plenty of other destinations came in joint-third place, however – all bagging a score of 9.7 in the research.
This includes Nice, France as well as Amsterdam, Lille in France and Palermo, Italy.
The results reveal which European cities are the most walkable and which ones may require other forms of transport to get around efficiently.
To determine which European cities are easiest to explore on foot, the research analysed the average distance between the five most popular attractions in each location, along with elevation, estimated travel time and step counts.
People walking at the Ribeira neighborhood in Porto, Portugal – in joint first place
However, not all European cities are easily accessible by foot.
As part of the research from Radical Storage, the study discovered which cities are least walkable, often with long distances between attractions, unrealistic step counts and may even require additional forms of transport to complete the route.
The research found that Oslo, Norway, ranks as Europe’s least walkable city.
Marseille, France, ranks as the second least walkable city and Helsinki in Finland came third.
