Decatur Active Living’s Cheryl Burnette sent along this announcement…

Oakhurst Elementary School was selected as the 2015 Georgia Safe Routes to School Resource Center’s Partner of the Year for the Metro Atlanta Area. Winners of this award are chosen based on the progress of their SRTS programs during the past year in getting more students to walk and bike to school and increasing the awareness of SRTS within its community. The Georgia Safe Routes to School Resource Center has recognized outstanding partners with the Partner of the Year Award since 2011. Clairemont Elementary won the award in 2013 and Renfroe Middle School won in 2014.

Under the leadership of Parent Champion Heather Tell, Oakhurst Elementary students, staff, teachers, and parents have embraced the Safe Routes to School program as part of the core culture of the school. Over 60% of students regularly walk and bike to school—the highest percentage of any City of Decatur school—and they constantly strive to improve that number. The school sponsors a monthly Walk and Roll to School Day celebration, with fun themes and prizes to encourage participation, donations from local businesses, and bicycle bells for kids. Safety tips are included in the school’s weekly newsletter, and all 450 students learn basic bike safety at the annual Fall Health and Wellness Festival. With a strong School Leadership Team and the support of the City of Decatur Active Living, the Decatur Police Department, the Georgia SRTS Outreach Coordinator, and City of Decatur schools, Oakhurst is an enthusiastic and highly successful Partner in the SRTS program.

For more information on the City of Decatur Safe Routes to School program visit www.decaturga.com/srts.

Photo courtesy of Decatur Active Living

As some of you have already mentioned, the closure of East Howard between Church and McDonough will affect Safe Routes to School.  Here’s CSD’s release and a map above …

Construction on the Trinity Triangle project will impact Safe Routes to School. 

From the City of Decatur Design, Environment & Construction Division:

Trinity Triangle: Bike-Ped-Car Changes for September 29, 2014 until (possibly) Spring 2016.
Construction at Trinity and E. Howard will begin in full on Monday, September 29.

Here is what travelers need to know:

• E. Howard will be closed for bike-ped-car traffic including the PATH trail for an 18-24 month period starting this weekend.
• In addition, there will be no sidewalk service on the south side of Trinity Street between Church Street and E. Howard Avenue. For this reason, there will be no mid-block crossing on Trinity.

Alternate routes will be posted on the street this weekend. Here is a snapshot of those alternate routes:

• The alternate PATH bike route will be on Church Street and Sycamore Street.
• The alternate pedestrian routes for the E. Howard will be on Church Street and E. College Street.
  Please direct any questions to:

JOHN MAXIMUK, AICP
Director
City of Decatur Public Works Department
Design, Environment & Construction Division
(office) 678.553.6570
[email protected]
2635 Talley Street, P.O. Box 220, Decatur, GA 30031

How was the commute this morning?

The Atlanta Bicycle Coalition announced their annual awards last week and one of Decatur’s commissioners received a notable honor.  From the press release…

This year, the Atlanta Bicycle Coalition’s Blinkie Awards launched The Inaugural Fred Boykin Lifetime Achievement Award: Fred Boykin, Decatur City Commissioner and owner, Bicycle South. Commissioner Boykin has been a dedicated public servant committed to making it safe for kids to bike and walk through the Safe Routes to School initiative. Through his leadership, Decatur schools now support higher rates of biking and walking to school than any other metro Atlanta school system, attracting new residents while helping children stay healthy and active. He is also the owner of Bicycle South, Inc., a Decatur-area business since 1972.

The Georgia Department of Transportation is finally getting around to building out a “Safe Routes to School transportation improvement” project and some residents don’t approve of one particular element of the project, moving the entrance to Glennwood Elementary to align with Sycamore Place. A petition created by surrounding residents to oppose the plan states…

“The current plan would result in the loss of existing trees and the current school sign and will create a much shorter front driveway for the school. The shorter driveway will result in the buses loading in the lower parking lot where carpool is currently held. This will result in requiring staggered dismissal times, which will be a considerable inconvenience for teachers and families. It will also result in traffic backups onto East Ponce de Leon, as parents’ cars will not be able to maneuver past the busses into the lower parking lot. Finally, there is a safety concern with having Sycamore Place end directly into our driveway, as a distracted driver may continue driving straight through the light without noticing the transition from street to driveway.”

City Manager Peggy Merriss says that the plan is “part of a Safe Routes to School transportation improvement that the City and the City Schools requested a number of years ago that GDOT is just getting around to completing.”  She adds that the plan “also includes improvements to the intersection at Commerce Drive and Sycamore Place, installation of bike racks and some other items.”

There also seem to be differing explanations of why the plan was conceived in the first place.

According to the City Manager, the current situation along the street is that “…the intersection at East Ponce de Leon and Sycamore Place followed quickly by the entrance to the drive at Glennwood Elementary is a challenging one for pedestrians, cyclists and vehicles to negotiate and rebuilding it would improve conditions.”  But opposing residents say the work was initially planned because of increased traffic due to it being a 4/5 Academy and that it is now unnecessary because Glennwood is now a neighborhood school and “many families living within walking or biking distance.”

So it sounds like there are a few different viewpoints on the purpose and result of the project at this point.  Either way, Ms. Merriss also tells DM that “…the City is aware of the City Schools concerns about timing of construction and disruption to the school.  We are trying to get GDOT’s cooperation in reviewing the project to address the concerns.”

Photo courtesy of Google Maps

A reader reminded me of a program that’s been around a while that perhaps was not on everyone’s radar: Decatur Active Living’s bike donation program. Director Greg White was good enough to recap the history and ins and outs of the program.

The bike donation was started when we started the Safe Routes to School program in 2007 so that we would have enough bikes for training students how to ride safely.   We started with a bike donation from the police department with about 20 bikes.

Over the past  years parents and individuals from the community have given us bikes.  The Fraternal Order of Police has given us new bikes and Sopo Bikes has provided donations.  We currently have a fleet in the neighborhood of over 30 bikes.  The Police Department has identified all of the bikes in case they are lost or stolen to assist with recovery.  Decatur Active Living would like 20” bikes that are used during the training of all the fourth graders at the 4/5 Academy at 5^thAvenue.  Bikes that need repairing are repaired by Bicycle South who does our annual maintenance prior to delivering the bikes to the school.

The fleet of bikes are delivered by Decatur Active Living staff and during the training the City of Decatur School system allow us to store the bikes on the school grounds.  To donate a bike please contact Gregory White ([email protected] ) or Cheryl Burnette ([email protected] ).  Phone: .  

Decatur City Commissioner Fred Boykin sends along this call for volunteers from Decatur Active Living’s Cheryl Burnette…

Decatur Active Living and the Safe Routes to School Program will be doing Bicycle Safety Training for the 4th grade students at Fifth Avenue. We will be teaching on Thursday, Sept 20, Friday Sept. 21 and Monday-Wednesday, Sept 24-26. All teaching occurs on the Fifth Avenue School Playground.

We need volunteers! Volunteers have the choice of the following times each day:

• 7:45- 10am
• 9:45 – 11:45am
• 12:15 – 2:15pm

Please let me know which day(s) and time(s) you might be able to assist. You do not need to know how to ride a bicycle. We will be teaching them basic signals, and other various skills. We can train you on the job!

Please consider giving a few hours of your time to help with teaching the children how to ride their bicycles safely. It is loads of fun seeing how excited the children get.

UPDATE:  Another update from Rails to Trails indicates that the amendment, which would have restored funding to Safe Routes, Rails to Trails, etc, failed to pass by a vote of 27 to 29.

Julie sent in this alert that she received from Rails to Trails yesterday…

We aren’t exaggerating when we say this ask has never been more urgent.

Please read more and take action now.We have until 4 p.m. EST today to have our thoughts heard.

Tomorrow, Thursday, February 2, the Transportation and Infrastructure (T&I) Committee in the U.S. House of Representatives will be voting on our nation’s next multiyear surface transportation bill.

There’s no way to spin this: From the perspective of trails, walking and bicycling, the bill is a total disaster.

Among its worst features are:

• It eliminates dedicated funding for the Transportation Enhancements (TE) program—the nation’s largest funding source for trails, walking and bicycling. (Terrible news, but we expected it.)
• It removes the rail-trail category from TE eligibility.
• It completely eliminates funding for the Safe Routes to School program.
• It eliminates funding for bicycle and pedestrian coordinators at state DOTs.

But there’s still a chance…

Representatives Tom Petri (R-Wis.) and Tim Johnson (R-Ill.) are considering the introduction of an amendment in the committee that would right many of the bill’s wrongs.

But they need to hear from other committee members that their amendment has a fighting chance.

Please: Take two minutes and ask your representatives to defend trails, walking and bicycling. We only have until 4 p.m. EST today, so any additional support you’re able to gather will make an enormous difference!’

A follow-up email breathed a cautious sigh of relief noting that an amendment saving the programs mentioned above had already been drafted.  According to Rails-to-Trails “Due to its last minute filing and its becoming the major focus of attention for tomorrow’s debate and vote on the bill, congressional discussion on the amendment will go late into the night.”

Guess we’ll just have to wait and see at this point.