Source: Wikipedia user Ken Kinder
Set on the banks of the San Antonio River, and appropriately nicknamed “River City,” the city of San Antonio is a popular destination to both visit and to live in. Its population of 1.3 million makes San Antonio the second largest city in Texas, and from 1990 to 2000 it was one of the fastest growing cities in the country. Parts of the city are great for walking around though in general San Antonio isn’t really a walk-friendly city – Walk Score ranks it the 40th most walkable large city in the nation with a score of 41, but how do the individual neighborhoods stack up?
Downtown San Antonio
Source: Wikipedia user Zereshk
Right in the heart of San Antonio the downtown neighborhood is a great place to live, for numerous reasons! It’s the most walkable part of the city with a Walk Score of 89 so you can ditch the car and get around by foot if you’re living or visiting. Known as the Downtown Loop, or Central Loop because it’s encircled by highways, downtown is home to the city’s tallest buildings but also some of its oldest. There are historical districts, and the best known attraction in the whole of San Antonio is located here: The Alamo. River Walk is very popular too, and it’s lined with great cafes and restaurants. Museums, shopping, offices, and more all grace the streets of downtown San Antonio, and, as cost of living goes it’s really quite affordable. Crime rates are very slightly lower than San Antonio as a whole, and the area is good for families with its selection of schools.
Tobin Hill
Around 4,000 people live in Tobin Hill, just to the north of downtown San Antonio, and it’s the third most walkable neighborhood in the city with a Walk Score of 76. Tobin Hill has a little bit of everything including grocery stores, restaurants, schools, entertainment, but it’s a little higher in the crime department with a 26 percent higher crime index than the city as a whole. Still, the cost of living here is affordable, and being so close to downtown is convenient.
Five Points
Source: Wikipedia user Larry D. Moore
Five Points is a compact neighborhood of around 1,600 people and it’s set just to the north of downtown, north of the I35 and east of the I10 so getting onto the freeways is very easy from here! Five Points is a nice combination of residential and mixed-use, including grocery stores, restaurants, shopping, and schools, and right on the northern perimeter of the neighborhood is the spacious San Pedro (aka San Pedro Springs) Park; the oldest park in Texas. Crime is more obvious in Five Points than other parts of San Antonio, coming in 49 percent in higher than the city average so you have a 1 in 11 chance of being a victim of crime here. Cost of living is low, and there are schools here, but the graduation rates are well below the city and state averages. Five Points’ Walk Score is 79.
Lavaca
Lavaca is centrally located within ‘the loop’ and just south of downtown San Antonio. The population is around 1,800 and Lavaca has a Walk Score of 76. Grocery stores, restaurants, schools, and parks are right within the neighborhood while downtown San Antonio is very close by. Being close to downtown has its drawbacks – children do not do as well in school here with only 45 percent having completed high school, and the same can be said for the crime rate, which is 31 percent higher than the San Antonio average. At the northern edge of Lavaca is the Institute of Texan Cultures, set within HemisFair Park, the venue for the 1968 World’s Fair and home to the Tower of the Americas observation tower.
King William
The fifth best place to live in San Antonio according to Walk Score is King William. This neighborhood has a Walk Score of 74 and is home to around 1,800 people. Just south of downtown San Antonio, King William features great access to the downtown core and has many of its own amenities including schools, grocery stores, restaurants, and parks. It’s a slightly more desirable neighborhood so the cost of living is a little higher, pushed up more by housing than anything else. Crime rates are much lower here though – the crime index is 60 percent lower than the San Antonio average, and the high school graduation rate is just above the city average. River Walk passes the neighborhood too and there are a couple of museums to visit.
