Safe Routes to School

For more information about SRTS in Tampa, check out their local website.

For the 2008/09 year, the Safe Routes to School program offered a pilot program service to five Hillsborough County Public Schools in an effort to promote “walking school buses and bicycle trains.” A walking school bus is a group of children walking to school with one or more adults.  A variation on the walking school bus is a bicycle train where a group of children and adult leaders bicycle to school together.

Throughout the year, Safe Routes to School coordinators conducted walk and bicycle to school events, meetings, school contests, community outreach, student pedestrian and bicycle rodeos and in-school educational safety seminars.  Through coordinated walk and bike events to school, Safe Routes to School coordinators focused on matching already walking and biking groups to school.

Walk and bike parades to school gave parents and students the sense of safety and empowerment to walk and bike on other days of the school year; as a result families contributed to the reduction of congestion around their schools while increasing their physical activity.

The Bicycle Club has been volunteering to help with the Safe Routes to School “walking school bus and bicycle train program.” Club members help by leading bicycle trains for students to their schools.