Safe Routes to School Program

Program Purpose | Program Elements | Statistics and Facts

What is Safe Routes to School?

Forty years ago, roughly half of all children ages five to 18 years old walked and bicycled to school. Approximately 25% of the country’s morning traffic is made up of private motor vehicles driving children to school. Today, 85% of our nation’s children are driven to school either by bus or car. This dramatic change in transportation mode has added to traffic congestion, a reduction in air quality and the deterioration of our children’s health. In Mississippi, four out of ten children are at risk of becoming overweight or are overweight.

In response to these and other concerns, the Safe Routes to School (SRTS) Program was created by Section 1404 of the Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient Transportation Equity Act: A Legacy for Uses (SAFETEA-LU).

Program Purpose

The Safe Routes to School Program empowers communities to make walking and bicycling to school a safe and healthy alternative to being driven to school by bus or motor vehicle. Safe Routes makes funding available for a wide variety of projects and activities, from building safer street crossings to establishing programs that encourage children and their parents to walk and bicycle safely to school.

Elements of Safe Routes to School Programs

Communities use many different approaches to make it safer for children to walk and bicycle to school and to increase the number of children doing so. Programs use a combination of education, encouragement, enforcement and engineering activities to help achieve their goals. Another important element is evaluation, which is incorporated throughout all areas.

Education

Education activities target parents, neighbors and other drivers in the community to remind them to yield to pedestrians, to drive safely and to take other actions to make it safer for pedestrians and bicyclists. Parents serve as role models for their children and plan an important part in teaching them pedestrian and bicycle safety. Education activities also teach students how to walk and bicycle safely and the benefits of doing so.

Encouragement

Encouragement strategies generate excitement about walking and bicycling safely to school. Children, parents, teachers, school administrators and others can all be involved in special events like International Walk to School Day and ongoing activities like walking school buses. Encouragement strategies can be started relatively easily with little cost and a focus on fun.

Enforcement

Enforcement activities can help to change unsafe behaviors of drivers, bicyclists and pedestrians. They can increase driver awareness of laws and can improve driver behavior by reducing speeds and increasing yielding to pedestrians. Enforcement activities teach pedestrians and bicyclists to walk and bicycle safely and to pay attention to their environment. Enforcement doesn’t just involve law enforcement. Many different community members take part in making sure everyone follows the rules, including students, parents, school personnel and adult school crossing guards. In addition, the role of the law enforcement officers can be included in all strategies of the SRTS program.

Engineering

Engineering addresses the built environment with tools that can be used to create safe places to walk or bicycle and can also influence the way people behave. Transportation engineers, city planners and architects uses methods to create safer setting for walking and bicycling while recognizing that a roadway needs to safely accommodate all modes of transportation. Such improvements can include maintenance and operational measures as well as construction projects with a range of costs. When such programs are properly implemented, they may not only improve safety for children, but they also may encourage more walking and bicycling by the general public.

Supporting Statistics and Facts

Public Health Benefits of Participating in SRTS:

Lifelong Health: addresses obesity, asthma, diabetes, bone health, mental health.
Children’s Skill Development: traffic skills for mobility, socialization, independence, lifelong habits (reduce the number of child pedestrian crashes)
Children’s Academic Performance: concentration, problem solving ability, and mood are enhanced by physical activity.
Community Livability: Active community environments (safety, access, aesthetics, functionality), traffic safety, congestions, community cohesiveness, small neighborhood schools, environmental stewardship, reduced air pollution, reduced need for bussing

Our Children Need to Get Out and Get Some Exercise!

24% of Mississippi students in grades 1 through 8 are overweight, and another 14.7% are at risk of becoming overweight; 25.2% of students in grades 6 through 8 were found to be overweight. Therefore, 4 out of 10 students grades 1 – 8 are overweight or at risk of becoming overweight.
There is a Mississippi trend of increasing prevalence of overweight by grade (17.5% in grade 1 compared with 31.3% in grade 8).
Obesity has steadily increased among Mississippians 18 years and older since 1990. In 1990, 15% of Mississippians 18 years old were obese; in 2002, that number had increased to 26.8%.
24% of US children are now obese, a 55% increase from 1963. The prevalence of overweight children has tripled.
Asthma rates in children have increased 160% in the past 15 years.
Public health researchers have begun to speculate that this generation may be the first to not live as long as their parents.

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