Bike Bakersfield’s Safe Route to School program (SRTS) is a program that enables and encourages walking and biking to and from school. The SRTS program integrates health, fitness, traffic relief, environmental awareness and safety under one program. This program will offer the children of our community a healthy lifestyle and a safer and cleaner environment for everyone.
SCHOOL STARTS AUGUST 23
HERE ARE SOME HELPFUL TIPS FOR
WALKING & BIKING TO SCHOOL .
International Walk to School Day
10-06-2010 (Wednesday)
Details coming soon...
What is Safe Routes to School?
  
Safe Routes to School is an international movement that has taken hold in communities throughout the United States. The concept is to increase the number of children who walk or bicycle to school by funding projects that remove the barriers that currently prevent them from doing so. Those barriers include lack of infrastructure, unsafe infrastructure, lack of programs that promote walking and bicycling through education/encouragement programs aimed at children, parents, and the community.
Why is Safe Routes to School important?
Thirty years ago, 60% of children living within a 2-mile radius of a school walked or bicycled to school. Today, that number has dropped to less than 15%. Roughly 25% commute by school bus, and well over half are driven to/from school in vehicles. And back then, 5% of children between the ages of 6 and 11 were considered to be overweight or obese. Today, that number has climbed to 20%. These statistics point to a rise in preventable childhood diseases, worsening air quality and congestion around schools, and missed opportunities for children to grow into self reliant, independent adults.
Many of us remember a time when walking and bicycling to school was a part of everyday life. In 1969, about half of all students walked or bicycled to school.1 Today, however, the story is very different. Fewer than 15 percent of all school trips are made by walking or bicycling, one-quarter are made on a school bus, and over half of all children arrive at school in private automobiles.2
This decline in walking and bicycling has had an adverse effect on traffic congestion and air quality around schools, as well as pedestrian and bicycle safety. In addition, a growing body of evidence has shown that children who lead sedentary lifestyles are at risk for a variety of health problems such as obesity, diabetes, and cardiovascular disease.3 Safety issues are a big concern for parents, who consistently cite traffic danger as a reason why their children are unable to bicycle or walk to school.4
Safe Routes to School Programs are intended to reverse these trends by funding projects that improve safety and efforts that promote walking and bicycling within a collaborative community framework. It is through local champions working with a coalition of parents, schools, professionals in transportation, engineering, health, law enforcement that the most sustainable projects are expected to emerge.
1"Transportation Characteristics of School Children," Report No. 4, Nationwide Personal Transportation Study, Federal Highway Administration, Washington, DC, July 1972.
2"Data from the 2001 National Household Travel Survey conducted by Federal Highway Administration were used as the source."
3"Physical activity and the health of young people," U.S. Centers for Disease Control & Prevention, Fact Sheet, 2004.
4"Barriers to Children Walking and Biking to School," CDC, 2005. |
