Members of Starkville in Motion, an organization dedicated to improving pedestrian and cyclist safety, are eager for construction to begin next fall on the Safe Routes to Schools project.
“We thought we could get started this academic year, but it looks like it is going to be next fall before we have mortar down,” Ward Alderman and SIM member Matt Cox said.
The SRTS program is a cooperative effort between the city of Starkville, SIM and the Starkville School District to provide sidewalks, bike lanes and traffic-calming devices as well as an educational outreach program for children traveling to and from school.
The Mississippi Department of Transportation awarded Starkville a $281,476 grant for SRTS in July 2007 through a federal transportation enhancement fund.
The new infrastructure improvements include proposed bike lanes connecting Rolling Hills and Green Oaks subdivisions with Ward Stewart Elementary School and Henderson Intermediate School. Along these routes are proposed sidewalks to connect the existing sidewalks and caution lights at high traffic intersections. Chair of SIM’s Safe Routes to Schools committee Lois Connington said MDOT has held up the engineering aspect of the project.
The city finished preliminary engineering, Cox said. Now, the consultant engineer’s work is waiting to be finished and approved.
Cox worked with retired city engineer Bill Webb to put together cost estimates and prepare for the project.
“Anytime hundreds and thousands of tax dollars are involved this is an appropriate process, but we are excited and want to get started and sometimes these steps take longer than we would like,” Cox said.
The rising cost of raw materials is also a concern, he said. The grant was based on the costs of concrete and asphalt a year ago, but the prices have risen more than expected and may not cover original plans. Cox said the longer it takes to begin construction the more this becomes an issue.
Connington said the education and encouragement part of the program has been held up as a result of the lack of progress within the engineering phase.
“The education needs to be implemented closer to when there is going to be a change in the infrastructure or parents’ perceptions are not going to change,” she said.
SIM recently hired Adrienne Morris to be the education and outreach coordinator. She will be in charge of raising awareness of infrastructure and safety needs through Walk and Ride to School Days, adult-supervised neighborhood walks and bike rides, educational material for schools and similar projects, Connington said.
Eric Heiselt, co-president of the Ward Stewart PTA, said the educational outreach program does not affect many kids in his district because the neighborhoods and possible routes are not safe.
“If there were sidewalks or safe bike lanes for students and their families, I think more would be used,” said Heiselt, a father of three.
Several parents with children attending Ward Stewart Elementary, Henderson Intermediate School and Armstrong Middle School completed a survey given by the schools in November 2007 that asked their thoughts on children walking and biking to school. The results showed that even though most of the parents consider walking and biking to be healthy, they would not allow their children to walk or bike alone to school.
According to the survey, distance was the largest reason followed by traffic volume and speed. More than 60 percent of the parents marked that they live over two miles from the school their children attend. Only 15 percent said they live within one mile.
Devon Brenner, SIM president, said that a great obstacle for the program is getting people to buy into it because public perception is that kids are safer in a car. Statistics show that kids are safer walking rather than riding in a car but statistics are only so comforting, she said.
The next largest concern among parents who took the survey was crime and violence. Cookie Leffler, SRTS coordinator for MDOT, said part of the education and encouragement program will be the creation of parent-supervised walks and rides to school described as walking school buses and bike trains, so children’s safety remains in an adult’s hands.
Connington said SRTS plans to launch the first summer safety camp in 2009 for children in grades fourth through eighth. This will be a half-day program to promote safe walking and biking habits.
Judy Couey, Starkville School District’s superintendent, said she would like to see Starkville go back to a time when every child can feel safe walking to school.
She also said she is placing minimal emphasis on the program until construction at Ward Stewart and Henderson is complete. It will be about 1.5 to two years before the children are encouraged to use the proposed routes because it is not safe to use them while the school is under construction, she said.
City engineer Edward Kemp said he could not put a time line on the completion of the funded infrastructure improvements because there are too many varying factors. Some of these factors include the approval of the consultant contracts and final design, construction bids and the construction around the schools. He said spring would be the earliest construction would begin.
“We feel we have good community support along the routes, but when we start building is when we’ll know for sure,” Brenner said.
Cox said everyone from the state level down is realizing the growing importance of providing the SRTS program.
MDOT has awarded 17 SRTS grants since the funding became available in 2005.
The state looked at Starkville around the time the city went smoke-free and said Starkville should lead in promoting healthy living with programs like SRTS, Leffler said.
She also said the success of the SRTS program on the state level is so great that she hopes it shows Congress that it needs to receive permanent appropriations.