title: Health impact of motorised trips that could be replaced by walking.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  We aimed to quantify the number of women and men, in Catalonia, among those not achieving physical activity recommendations, making short motorized trips which could have been made on foot, and to estimate the annual economic benefit due to reducing mortality as a result of replacing one short, daily, motorized journey with walking.
  
  
  METHODS
  Cross-sectional study. Mobility data came from individuals >17 years who reported, in the 2006 Daily Mobility Survey, having travelled on the referred working day (N = 80,552). The health economic assessment tool for walking (HEAT) from the World Health Organization (WHO) Regional Office for Europe was used to calculate the economic benefit.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Of those not meeting recommendations, 15.6% of men (95% CI 15.2-16.1) and 13.9% of women (95% CI 13.5-14.4) would go on to meet them if they were to replace at least one short motorized trip per day by walking. If applied to the entire population of Catalonia, this change would increase up to 326,557 men (95% CI 313 373-339,740) and up to 252,509 women (95% CI 240,855-264,163) who would achieve recommendations through walking rather than driving. According to HEAT estimations, this would suppose a saving of €124,216,000 (95% CI 120,182,000-128,250,000) in men and €84,927,000 (95% CI 81,774,000-88,079,000) in women, derived from the reduction in mortality gained from walking accumulated over one year.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  This study demonstrates the potential of trips on foot as a source of physical activity. It also points out that both benefits for the health of the population and a huge economic benefit could have been gained through active transportation interventions.
authors.affiliation: Agència de Salut Pública de Barcelona, Institute of Biomedical Research, IIB Sant Pau, Barcelona, Spain.
authors.forename: Marta
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Olabarria
authors.forename: Katherine
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Pérez
authors.forename: Elena
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Santamariña-Rubio
authors.forename: Ana M
authors.initials: AM
authors.lastname: Novoa
authors.forename: Francesca
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Racioppi
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001334:Automobile Driving; D001642:Bicycling / Q000191:economics / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D005060:Europe; D015444:Exercise; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009043:Motor Activity; D011159:Population Surveillance; D015995:Prevalence; D014186:Transportation / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D014195:Travel / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D016138:Walking / Q000191:economics / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D055815:Young Adult