Introduction: Patients with degenerative compression myelopathy (DCM) most commonly complain of gait-onset difficulty typically prominent after periods of inactivity. This feature stands in contrast with the post-exerciseneurogenic claudication characteristic of lumbar spinal stenosis (LSS). Aims: To test if DCM patients indeed have a greater difficulty at the beginning of gait than in steady-state conditions as compared with age-, gender-, and height-matched healthy subjects and LSS patients. Methodology: We studied 49 consecutive, ambulatory DCM patients, 11 controls, and 10 LSS patients. After sitting in a chair for 10-min, immobilizing the lower-limb muscles, the subject walked 15 m one way and returned the same distance with one turn at the maximum comfortable speed. A 2.64-m long ground reaction force plate allowed measurement of the step lengths, cadences, and speeds for the initial and terminal 2.64-m walks. Results: Unlike the controls or LSS, the DCM had a smaller (p__ampersandsignlt;0.001) step length-to-height ratio for the initial than final 2.64- m walk. The initial-to-final walking speed ratios showed smaller values in DCM (85.1__ampersandsignplusmn;9.4 %,) than in the controls (93.8__ampersandsignplusmn;6.2 %; p__ampersandsignlt;0.01) and LSS (96.5__ampersandsignplusmn;7.3 %; p__ampersandsignlt;0.001). Both the step length and walking speed for the initial 2.64-m in DCM significantly correlated with the lower-limb motor scores and the number of taps in the 10-sec foot-tapping test that quantifies the slowness of voluntary leg movements. Conclusions: Reduced walking speed in DCM became more pronounced immediately following 10-min sitting. This phenomenon seems to represent an additional aspect of the same physiologic mechanisms that characterize spastic gait disorders. Altered descending central drive caused by corticospinal tract involvement may account for this phenomenon, combined with rest-induced hyperexcitability of the pertinent anterior horn cells.