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The following sentences are from a post on the [Particle を & Intransitive
Motion Verbs](https://nihononthego.tumblr.com/post/92042789505/grammar-
particle-%E3%82%92-intransitive-motion-verbs):

> Japanese: よくこの道を歩いた。  
>  English: I often walked along this street.
>
> Japanese: 毎日公園を走った。  
>  English: Every day I run through the park.
>
> Japanese: 鳥が空を飛んだ。  
>  English: The birds flew across the sky.

I was taught that the で particle indicates places that actions occur, or more
specifically indicates the _boundaries within which_ actions occur, or the
_means by which they occur_. With that in mind, it seems like で is a better
choice of particle in the above sentences?

**Question:** What is the difference in meaning between these sentence pairs
like the following:

> よくこの **道を** 歩いた。
>
> よくこの **道で** 歩いた。

> 毎日 **公園を** 走った。
>
> 毎日 **公園で** 走った。

> 鳥が **空を** 飛んだ。
>
> 鳥が **空で** 飛んだ。
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particles
を vs. で for Intransitive Motion Verbs
よくこの道を歩いた。 is more natural.  
よくこの道で歩いた。 can be used, but it feels like the speaker talks about walking like
he's now speaking about his experience of exercise.

Both 毎日公園を走った。 and 毎日公園で走った。 are natural, because both would be used when
talking about an experience of exercise.  
But If you wanna talk about days you ran across the park and you got home so
fast, then you should use the former one. The latter one is weird.

鳥が空を飛んだ。 would be always better. 鳥が空で飛んだ。 feels like the bird has flied
somewhere else but the sky. That's odd.  
Plus そらで has a meaning of "by heart" like 私はこの曲をそらで歌える。. That's so confusing.
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I generally think of で as meaning "in/within/around in"/etc (in a given
space). On the other hand, を with these sorts of verbs means more
"over/across/along/through"/etc (along a given path). So:

> 道 **を** 歩いた  
>  I walked _along_ the street (the street was the path I was walking along. I
> was using the street to get from one place to another.)

> 道 **で** 歩いた  
>  I walked _at_ the street (I was at the street when I started walking, and I
> never left the street, or I went to the street and then I started walking
> around there (which seems like an odd situation, to be honest))

or

> 公園 **を** 走った  
>  I ran _through_ the park (I ran from one end of the park to the other, or
> along a path that covers most of the park, etc)

> 公園 **で** 走った  
>  I ran _around in_ the park (I ran somewhere within the confines of the
> park. I went to the park and then ran there for a while, etc.)

The point is that で merely indicates the area within which the activity was
confined, but を more explicitly refers to the _path or route_ which was taken
or over which the activity occurred (and is part of the intent of the
activity).
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**You basically cannot use で with these movement verbs.** A rare exception is
when the action does not involve the actual change of place, or when such a
change of place is not important at all as the purpose of the action. (EDIT:
Another exception is when で is clearly used as a method marker, e.g.,
電車ではなく高速道路で行きます "I'll go not by train but using a highway".)

この道で歩く is almost always nonsense, and you should say この道を歩く instead. However,
if the context is a strange YouTube streamer who sets up and uses his
treadmill in different places, then saying 昨日はこの道で歩いた, 今日はトイレで歩く, 明日は図書館で歩く
and so on make sense because he stays in the same place while doing the action
of walking.

公園を走る is much more common, but 公園で走る is also acceptable if the context is
where you do your everyday exercise (the purpose is the running itself rather
than the change of place). If the park is relatively small and you run over
the same place many times, 公園で走る can be more acceptable. Likewise, プールで泳ぐ is
typically more natural than プールを泳ぐ because the purpose is usually recreation
or exercise rather than traveling (you move back and forth within the same
narrow area).

鳥が空で飛ぶ usually makes little sense, but it can be used when talking about a
wounded bird that has been training to fly in a facility. When it finally
tries to fly in the sky as the last step of its training, you could say
明日その鳥は初めて空で飛ぶ or something like that (the flying action and the location are
important but the traveling is unimportant). 僕は部屋で飛ぶ is a reasonable
catchphrase of a flight simulation game (you are experiencing the flying
without actually traveling), and in this case 僕は部屋を飛ぶ makes no sense.
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