The Center for Disease Control Advocates Complete Streets

The public health community, increasingly alarmed over Americans’ increasing waistlines, has sided wholeheartedly with the need to make our streets safe for walking and biking. Integrating physical activity into everyday life is a highly effective method of reducing obesity rates and all the health problems that can result.

CDC researchers pushed forward community recommendations for preventing obesity in the influential Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR). Out of 24 recommendations, 6 relate to complete streets. One directly references the National Complete Streets Coalition. Read more from the National Complete Streets Coalition’s blog.

 Some of those recommendations are listed here:

Make your streets meet the needs of all transportation users

www.activelivingresources.org

Complete Streets is a catchy name for a basic concept: that all streets, except perhaps limited access highways, should be designed and built for all users. This means pedestrians and bicyclists, transit users, people with disabilities, and yes, people using motor vehicles. For example, consider the streets in your neighborhood. If you live in a community built after World War II, your streets were most likely designed and built primarily for motor vehicles.

Ask yourself: are there sidewalks along the streets in my neighborhood? If there are sidewalks, is it safe for young children to use them? Is it safe for older folks to use them? Or, do the cars travel too fast; are the sidewalks right against the streets; are the sidewalks too narrow; are the sidewalks uneven and in need of maintenance?

Next, consider crossing the streets in your neighborhood. Are there marked crosswalks? Are there pedestrian crossing signals? Is there a lot of fast-moving traffic? Do cars stop for pedestrians trying to cross streets?

Then consider whether there is room on your streets for bicyclists. Do your streets have marked bike lanes or wide shoulders? Would you feel safe riding a bike on your streets? Would it be safe for ten year old children to ride bikes on your streets?

Streets and sidewalks are built with public funds, and should therefore accommodate all members of the public. Complete streets are those that do – the young and old, the physically able and the physically challenged, moms and dads pushing strollers, kids on bikes, as well as cars and buses and trucks. Keep in mind that in any given community, approximately 30 percent of the residents cannot or have chosen not to drive. They may be too young, they may have decided to “give up the keys” due to aging issues, they may be physically handicapped, or they may have simply made a lifestyle or economic choice not to have and operate a car.

The point is that nearly a third of the residents in your community are likely getting around by methods other than operating their own motor vehicle. They need places to walk or bicycle. They need complete streets.

DO YOU HAVE COMPLETE STREETS? So, what is a complete street? It is a street designed for everybody, not just drivers of motor vehicles. How can you tell if you have complete streets in your neighborhood? The easiest way to tell is to see who is using your streets. Do you see children walking to school? Do you see groups of adults walking for exercise? Do you see parents pushing strollers on the way to local stores? Do you see kids and grown-ups riding bikes to local parks? If the answer to most of these questions is yes, you probably have complete streets. If not, you probably donʼt.

ACTION ALERT: Fund Safe Routes to School

PA Walks & Bikes received one of only seven awards from Alliance for Biking & Walking totaling over $125,000.  These funds are granted to grassroots biking and walking advocacy organizations throughout the nation. The Advocacy Advance Grants will be used to jump-start emerging advocacy organizations and to fund innovative campaigns with the potential to dramatically increase biking and walking. These grants are a key part of the Advocacy Advance Partnership with the League of American Bicyclists.  Launched this year, the grants are made possible with generous funding by SRAM, Planet Bike, Bikes Belong, and Cannondale. Nearly 100 proposals totaling over $2 million were received in this first round.

Pennsylvania Walks and Bikes will put the $30,000 matching grant to work to help build the first statewide coalition for biking and walking in Pennsylvania. The coalition will work to ensure state bicycle and pedestrian laws, policies, and funding are enacted.  Jointly, we will build Livable Streets across Pennsylvania!

PA Walks & Bikes made its debut at the State Capitol in Harrisburg on May 5, 2009 for the first PA Bike Summit.  Michele cooperated with the leaders from the Lebanon Valley Bicycle Club, Bike Pittsburgh, The Bicycle Coalition of Greater Philadelphia and many others to host the event.  More than 100 cyclists rallied on the stairs of the CapitolBuilding to advance Safe Passing Legislation, Complete Streets and Safe Routes to School.  The rally hosted guests speakers from both the State House and Senate, Rails-to-Trails, and the State’s Secretary of Community and Economic Development among many key stakeholders in PA who support the advancement of pedestrian and bicyclists

Meet the new Board of Directors