How to Start an SRTS Program

Starting a Safe Routes to School (SRTS) program is an opportunity to make walking and bicycling to school safer and more accessible for children, including those with disabilities, and to increase the number of children who choose to walk and bicycle.

SRTS programs will help to improve children’s health, ease traffic congestion, lessen air pollution, and improve community members’ overall quality of life. Not only will an SRTS program improve walking and bicycling conditions near a school, but it can help to spread interest in enhancing recreational opportunities to other parts of the community.

This section provides a general framework for establishing an SRTS program based on what has worked in other communities and what various national SRTS organizations suggest. Ultimately, your school or municipality must decide on an approach that would work best for your individual community.

Who leads an SRTS program?

Anyone who is interested in improving children’s well-being, encouraging walking and bicycling to school, or enhancing a community can serve as the leader of the SRTS program. Read more.

What steps should we take to create an SRTS program?

The following recommended steps are based on what has worked in other communities across the country. Read more.

How do we sustain our SRTS program?

It takes time to develop or change cultural attitudes about transportation. Be sure to reintroduce your SRTS program at the beginning of every school year. Read more.

Sign up to receive a Walk or Roll to School Day Kit
(Deadline to register is August 31)

Register for training:

Bicycle Education
Crossing Guard

Information for

News

Celebrate Walk or Roll to School Day October 9, 2013. Sign up to receive a Walk to School Day kit.
The PA Safe Routes to School Resource Center is now accepting applications for mini-grants (up to $2,000) to fund noninfrastructure activities that enable and encourage children to safely walk and bicycle to school. The grant period will remain open until the grant funding has been awarded or until June 28, 2013, whichever occurs first.
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Schools (K-8) may apply for a walkability audit that assesses walking and biking routes to school and provides recommendations for improvement.
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Bicycle safety train-the-trainer will be held at six locations around the state this fall. Registration will be online in June.
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Read how some schools celebrate Walk or Roll to School Day. Mark your calendar for October 9, 2013, and make plans for your school to participate.
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About $58,500 in Safe Routes to School noninfrastructure grant money will fund 11 schools’ efforts in 2013 to educate and encourage students to walk or bicycle to school.
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Read how one school benefited from a walkability audit to assess its walking and biking routes to school.
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Online bicycle education videos help to teach bicyclists and motorists about bicycle safety and sharing the road. The videos are now on the Department of Education’s Standards Aligned System.
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Lesson plans to provide basic bicycle and pedestrian safety instruction to students are available for teachers to download for free. The lesson plans are now on the Department of Education’s Standards Aligned System.
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