Last October the Portland Bureau of Transportation (PBOT) conducted its annual International Walk & Roll to School Day—an initiative of the Safe Routes to School Program—at schools throughout Portland, including Beaumont Middle School. The Safe Routes program aims at improving the health of school kids by encouraging walking, biking, and rolling (by skateboard or scooter) to and from school and for recreation in the neighborhoods where they live. Since it was launched in 2005, the program has expanded from eight initial partner schools to over 100 today.
According to Janis McDonald, a Safe Routes to School coordinator with PBOT, 43 percent of students in the participating school now walk, bike, or roll to school—up 35 percent from when the program started. “We encourage biking and walking, and not just to and from school, but being more active in their whole life, because kids who are active are healthier and better learners,” McDonald said.
Safe Routes is a multi-pronged effort, targeting education and encouragement, enforcement, engineering, and evaluation. The education component includes teaching pedestrian safety to 2nd-graders and bike safety to 4th-, 5th-, and 6th-graders. The International Walk & Roll to School Day, in which 46 schools participated, is an example of encouragement. For enforcement, Safe Routes partners with the Portland Police Bureau and neighborhoods to work to ensure safety around schools and to encourage people to report traffic safety problems in their neighborhoods. For example, the yard signs you see around encouraging drivers to slow down and watch for children can be borrowed from Safe Routes.
Engineering will be using the income from the gas tax initiative to improve safety around schools by adding new cross walks, sometimes in combination with rapid-flash beacons on school routes. This spring PBOT staffers from the Safe Routes program are holding open houses at Portland area schools to learn about safety concerns. Participation by individual schools in Safe Routes is initiated either by someone at the school or by parents. Interested parties can be put in touch with school coordinators for the program by emailing saferoutes@portlandor.gov. The Safe Routes to School website is www.portlandoregon.gov/transportation/68014.