2010-2011 Summary Annual Report: Promotion

Highlights

• Selected 2010 Oberstar Safe Routes to School Award recipient, Alpine Elementary School of Alpine, Utah.
• Coordinated Walk to School events in the U.S. on October 6, 2010. Participation reached a record high with more than 3,500 registered events from all fifty states and the District of Columbia.
• Secured Walk to School Day letter of support from First Lady Michelle Obama.
• Held one in-person meeting of the National Review Group in March 2011.

Website

The National Center’s website, www.saferoutesinfo.org, is an efficient tool to facilitate the dissemination of information to the general public, state governments and local stakeholders. The more than 187, 000 visitors to the website in the reporting period highlight the growing interest and reach of SRTS. Visitors benefit from an array of easily accessible online resources from the SRTS Guide to news releases on new products and services, including case studies and available training.  

Below are the number of visits, visitors and pages viewed by quarter.

E-newsletter

The National Center’s Safe Routes Matters e-newsletter has more than 3,900 subscribers who receive a regular newsletter as well as news briefs that announce new resources and upcoming events.

International Walk to School events

The National Center for Safe Routes to School actively promotes International Walk to School Day and Month in October, and maintains websites especially designed for the event (www.walktoschool.org for U.S. and www.iwalktoschool.org for the international community).

In 2010 participation reached another record high with more than 3,500 events from all 50 states and the District of Columbia registered on the Walk to School website (www.walktoschool.org). Many additional communities held events but did not register.

The National Center for Safe Routes to School supports Walk to School Day and Month in a variety of ways beyond its websites.

• Secured Walk to School Day letter of support from First Lady Michelle Obama.
• Formed a promotional partnership with the makers of Green Works® to encourage families to get outside to walk, bike and wheel to school together during Walk to School Month. Activities included: short-term national media relations support communicating Walk to School Day/Month events and messages, placement of a Walk to School-themed advertorial in two national magazines, and the creation of a Walk to School competition on Facebook, Walk to School Challenge www.facebook.com/greenworks.
• Developed and distributed six weekly Walk to School Day e-newsletters for 2010 event organizers.
• Participated in Walk to School Day events in New York City, as a part of the National Center’s promotional partnership with Green Works, and in Maryland, with US DOT Secretary LaHood and Maryland’s State SRTS Coordinator.

The Walk to School website received 76,651 visits during the reporting period. Twenty-six percent of visitors typed the address directly into their browser; the majority of the rest of the traffic came from search engines and from referring websites, such as www.saferoutesinfo.org and www.iwalktoschool.org.

James L. Oberstar Safe Routes to School Award

The National Center established the Safe Routes to School Award in 2007 to recognize outstanding achievement in improving the health and well-being of an entire generation of school children by creating safer environments for walking and bicycling to school and encouraging children to walk to and from school. It is named for Congressman James L. Oberstar to honor his dedication to American schoolchildren as the pioneer for the National Safe Routes to School Program.

The National Center for Safe Routes to School selected Alpine, Utah’s Alpine Elementary School as the 2010 recipient based on its exemplary Safe Routes to School program successes. James Christian, Utah FHWA Division Administrator and Roland Stanger, Safety Operations Engineer with FHWA presented the Safe Routes to School Award to Alpine Elementary School students, parents and teachers at the school on January 19, 2011.

National Review Group

In 2009, the National Center established a National Review Group comprised of more than 30 transportation, education, health and advocacy leaders, to provide advice and feedback on the goals and objectives of the National Center. 

• In lieu of a Fall 2010 conference call, individual calls were placed to all group members to provide updates on National Center work and to discuss collaboration opportunities.
• The third in-person meeting of the National Review Group was held in conjunction with the National Bike Summit in Washington D.C. in March 2011.The group discussed successful collaborations between the National Center and National Review Group members, new resources and website features available on the National Center website, and federal program evaluation efforts.

Participation in teleconferences and conferences related to SRTS

Staff from the National Center for Safe Routes to School participate in conferences as attendees and as presenters to reach groups of stakeholders who can influence the development and success of Safe Routes to School programs. Presentations were made at conferences including ProWalk ProBike, Bureau of Indian Education Summer Institute, National Bike Summit, New Partners for Smart Growth, Lifesavers Conference, and at the Using National Household Travel Survey Data for Transportation Decision Making Workshop. In addition, staff were invited to provide expert input at the Transportation Research Board School Transportation Subcommittee, and staffed a booth at the U.N. Decade of Action for Road Safety Capitol Hill Event.

During this reporting period, National Center staff also planned and prepared for the 3rd SRTS National Conference, to be held in Minneapolis, MN in August 2011. The National Center will be a presenting sponsor for the conference.