Here, finally, are photos from Northfield’s Walk to School Day, October 8, 2009. The first features Austen Chytracek, who was the first walker I encountered at Woodley and Division Street early in the morning. He had walked from Greenvale Avenue on the other side of town, near where I live. The second photo shows the lack of crosswalk markings at the same intersection.

The third photo shows all the bikes parked at the Middle School and the fourth is a sidewalk scene near Greenvale Elementary. Notice how much space pedestrians can occupy, which makes it more apparent that they deserve to have the separate space that the sidewalk provides.

Here is our press release for this year:

Students at Northfield Middle School and the three public elementary schools will celebrate Walk to School Day again this year on Thursday, October 8.

It promises to be a fun event for many students who have a safe route available from their homes. Not only will they get to walk with their friends, but there will be prizes and recognition as well.

The event is part of the district’s Safe Routes to Schools program, which is designed to help students and communities gain the benefits from increased walking and biking. Those benefits include improved health, a stronger sense of community, and reduced traffic congestion and air pollution.

The event also helps to illustrate the benefits of “complete streets”–streets that are built to accommodate all users, including pedestrians, cyclists, and the handicapped. Unfortunately, all too often streets in our society are incomplete.

Students will receive maps of recommended routes, and adult volunteers will be stationed along the routes during the morning and afternoon travel times. A Northfield police officer will be located at the intersection of Jefferson Parkway and Division St./Highway 246 during both the Middle School and Bridgewater travel times. Bridgewater students who live east and northeast of the school are asked to ride the bus as usual due to concerns with that intersection.

Again this year Walk to School Day is funded through the Safe Routes to Schools grant that the school district and city won in 2008. The $30,000 grant includes money for “encouragement” programs such as Walk to School Day.

The grant has also funded an engineering study of walking and biking routes to the district’s K-8 schools. The study has been completed and will be released soon to the public.

The Northfield Safe Routes to Schools Task Force and Northfield Public Schools are organizing the local Walk to School Day in cooperation with the City of Northfield. Many schools around the world will be celebrating Walk to School Day a day earlier. Here in Northfield, the Safe Routes to Schools Task Force decided that the local school schedule makes October 8 a better day for the event.

Forty years ago nearly half of all kids walked or bicycled to school. Today less than fifteen percent get to school that way, and many are driven to school in motor vehicles. Public health experts believe that reductions in physical activity are partly to blame for dramatic increases in rates of diabetes and obesity in children.

Since 1997, communities around the U.S. have been celebrating Walk to School Day. Around the globe, International Walk to School Month brings together more than 40 countries in recognition of the common interest in walking to school.

In its twelfth year, U.S. participation reached a record high with more than 2,800 events from all fifty states and the District of Columbia registering in 2008. Many more communities held events but did not register. For more information visit the National Walk to School and International Walk to School web sites.

Over four years ago several of us Northfielders started working to make our area safer and more inviting for walking, biking, and otherwise getting around under our own power. In part we were building on others’ work, but in other ways we were breaking from the recent past—a past in which sidewalks often were not considered an important part of the street system and transportation plans made scant reference to nonmotorized modes of travel.

Since then, the collective efforts of the entire community—including elected leaders, city staff, interested citizens, and various boards, commissions, task forces, and community groups—have led to many improvements. Here are some examples:

• organization of the first Walk to School Day and a successful Safe Routes to Schools grant proposal, which funded, among other things, an engineering study of walking and biking routes to schools and training for a police officer and local citizens to become certified bicycle instructors

• pedestrian improvements such as a beautiful walkway along the river at 5th and Water Streets, a pedestrian wayfinding system downtown, new sidewalks in various locations, and additional time for the walk signals on Highway 3 at 2nd St. and 5th St.

• installation of more bicycle parking racks downtown and bike lanes on 5th Street

• construction of the Peggy Prowe Bridge over the Cannon River for the Mill Towns Trail

• and, most importantly, a new Comprehensive Plan, Transportation Plan, Parks Plan, and a draft Land Development Code that move us from a nearly total focus on motor vehicle transportation to a “complete streets” or multi-modal transportation outlook, including more options for mixed-use development

One group involved in these improvements, the Task Force on Nonmotorized Transportation, on which I have served as chair, will conclude in August after two years of service, but there is more that we must do as a community to advance a full range of transportation options. Following are three things that I hope Northfield can accomplish soon:

• implementation of the walkways and bikeways in the Parks and Trails plan, starting with the lowest-cost component: the on-street bike lanes and bike routes.

• creation of a permanent Transportation Commission to assist the City Council and city staff. It would address all modes of transportation, motorized and nonmotorized (including transit) and would help Northfield compete for scarce transportation dollars and advance important projects such as improvements to Highway 19.

• finally, we simply need more people out there traveling under their own power. More people on foot, bikes, skateboards, and roller blades will make streets and walkways safer and more inviting for everyone.

At a time when we face the tremendous challenge of climate change and growing health problems due to obesity and diabetes, it’s more important than ever that we continue to provide active, low-polluting transportation options to our citizens. And in a time of economic hardship, we must enable people to travel by less expensive means.

Bill Ostrem is chair of the Northfield Area Task Force on Nonmotorized Transportation

Here is the description that Dean created:

The Re-Employment ministries is a weekly job club to support anyone look for work, preparing for a layoff, or looking to change careers. We will have our first meeting at the church on August 4th at 7:00 pm. Be prepared to introduce yourself to the group. All are welcome to attend. Future meetings this month are August 11 and 18.

In a July 29 story, reporter Jim Hammerand wrote about the conclusion of our Task Force on Nonmotorized Transportation, which officially ends in mid-August. We had our last meeting in late July. I should clarify something that I did not make clear to Jim in my interview with him: the task force is ending because we felt that we had accomplished our major goals.

I took this photo of a double rainbow yesterday evening . Can you see the second rainbow above the more visible one?

It was a great sight, following quickly on the heels of a storm that had passed overhead from west to east.

Perhaps the most significant result that I’ve helped to achieve is winning a Safe Routes to Schools non-infrastructure grant for Northfield in 2008. (Many people played a role in that project.) A large portion of the grant has paid for a technical/engineering study of walking and biking routes around Northfield’s three elementary schools and its middle school. Now that study is wrapping up, and the public can view the draft of the plan at an upcoming open house.

What follows is a message about the open house prepared by Brian Welch of the City of Northfield.

The results of our study and the proposed Safe Routes to School Plan for Northfield schools will be presented at a Community Open House scheduled for Wed., June 10, 2009 from 6:00–8:00 p.m. in the Bridgewater Elementary School cafeteria located at 401 Jefferson Parkway.

Please join us to understand the findings of our study and proposed improvements to provide safer walking and bicycling conditions for our students, while having the opportunity to provide feedback.  If you have any questions, please contact Brian Welch at 507-645-3027 or Brian.Welch@ci.northfield.mn.us.

A representative from Mn/DOT will be there.  The format will be informal with easels/posters arranged around the room and chairs/tables available for discussions and for the public to fill out comment cards. Possible solutions for the Highway 246/Jefferson Parkway intersection will be included.

[Note: The following appears also as a post at Locally Grown Northfield. Comments can be made there; I've turned them off here. Be sure to note their rules for comment.]

Last August the Rice County Board of Commissioners made a change in their transportation policy that goes against the interests of people who walk, bike, or use wheelchairs in our community. It’s a change that’s detrimental to many of the most vulnerable users of our transportation system, including children, seniors, the poor, and the handicapped.

I’m talking about a change in a fairly arcane and complex policy: the Cost Participation Policy for Cooperative Roadway Construction Projects, which governs the share that the county pays on joint road projects with cities and townships. The policy applies to projects that are part of the county Capital Improvement Plan.

Why should we care about some complex policy? Because it governs the funding for county road projects – which we might also call the public right-of-way – in many of our communities, and because it shapes the way we think about transportation.

The changes made last summer involved the provisions for sidewalks and “bituminous bike paths,” or shared-use paths, along county roads in cities and towns. Previously, the county paid a share of the costs for replacement sidewalks and new and replacement paths – specifically, 55 percent of the cost for municipalities over 5,000 in population, and 100 percent of the cost for those under 5,000. With the change, the county moved these facilities into the “not eligible” category for county funding. In effect, they cut funding of these facilities in their Capital Improvement Plan by 100 percent. The commissioners voted 4-1 for this change last August, with the only exception being Galen Malecha of Northfield at that time.

As a pedestrian/bike advocate and chair of the Northfield Area Task Force on Nonmotorized Transportation, I was immediately concerned about the new policy. It seemed to me to be a step backwards. While more and more governments are passing “complete streets” policies that require them to consider all users of the public right-of-way in their road projects, my own county had adopted an anti-complete streets policy. (Governments with complete streets policies make sidewalks, paths, bike lanes, and other facilities – many of them important for safety purposes – a high priority. See my earlier post on complete streets; see also the Complete the Streets coalition web site.)

I was further irked by the fact that rather than putting sidewalks and paths into the “potential” category for funding – a category that includes storm sewers and traffic signals (and that would not have required any spending) – the county instead put them into the “not eligible” category, which includes items such as “sanitary sewer modification” and “new landscaping.”

It seemed to me that important elements of our transportation system had just been cut out of a whole level of government funding. So I began working with others to change the policy, either to restore sidewalk and path funding to its previous level or move it to the “potential” funding category, the latter being a compromise that represented a victory largely in principle only.

Our Task Force on Nonmotorized Transportation passed a resolution asking the County Board to change its policy, as did the city councils of Northfield and Faribault, the two largest cities in the county by far. Their populations make up about 41,000 out of the county’s 63,000 people, nearly two thirds of the total.

Once a new County Board was seated in January – with Jeff Docken replacing the departing Jim Brown in my own district – we asked the Board to change its policy. The policy was discussed at three different Board meetings. At the first two meetings, those speaking in favor of changing the policy outnumbered those in favor of keeping it by about 8:1 and 5:1. City council members, city staff, and citizens from Northfield and Faribault spoke out for the needs of people who walk, bike, and use wheelchairs in our communities – people such as children, the elderly, the poor, and the disabled.

After these first two meetings I mailed the commissioners a simple proposal to move sidewalks and paths to the “potential” category – sometimes called the “case-by-case” funding option. The commissioners’ Transportation Committee agreed to have the Board vote on two options: accepting this revision or keeping the policy unchanged.

A third County Board meeting addressed the policy on Tuesday, May 5. It was quite different from the first two. About seven people from county townships – rural parts of the county – spoke at the microphone to say they didn’t want the county funding sidewalks and paths. Some of them said that the current budget problems did not allow the county to spend money on such things. One speaker said that if the county wanted to pay for sidewalks and paths, it should do so by issuing fines to people walking and biking on the road.

I was the only person on the other side of the issue who spoke at this meeting, and after that last comment I expect I sounded angry as I read my statement (see below). Later in the meeting the Board discussed the issue, and Commissioners Gillen (who represents part of Northfield) and Plaisance again voiced their strong disapproval of changing the current policy. Gillen said he didn’t support funding the sidewalk and path that were part of an earlier project on Woodley Street in Northfield. Both men expressed anxiety about shortfalls the county faces in funding its roads given the current budget; they feared having to revert paved roads to gravel roads. Plaisance said it was “ridiculous” to fund sidewalks and paths at the present time with transportation funds.

Malecha and Docken pointed out that changing to the “case-by-case” funding option didn’t require spending any money on sidewalks and paths if the Board felt there wasn’t enough money to do so.

When the votes were tallied, Commissioner Bauer joined Gillen and Plaisance in opposing a change. Commissioner Docken joined Malecha in voting for a revised policy. The status quo prevailed by a single vote. Needless to say, I was disappointed by the outcome. (See the Northfield News article about the vote.)

The entire experience got me thinking about the tension between rural and urban interests in our county and at other levels of government. My impression of Rice County government is that rural residents feel more of a connection to it than do city residents, and they influence it out of proportion to their numbers. I’ve been struck by how many Northfield residents do not know who their county commissioner is. The residents of Rice County’s cities need to be informed and keep a close eye on county government to make sure it is meeting our needs. They should consider running for the County Board if necessary.

Rural residents should also remember that our far-flung road system is financed largely by the majority of people who live in urban areas; we urban residents subsidize rural roads because there are so many more of us and we pay the majority of taxes. We pay for the majority of goods and services in our economy.

This cost participation policy change has me wondering how efficient our huge system of paved roads actually is. Can we afford to keep every road paved if it means our urban roads have to be less safe as a result? At the same time, I believe my welfare is bound up with the welfare of those living in rural areas, and they have their own transportation needs.

Surely we need rural and urban people to recognize each other’s needs. However, that rural resident who voiced disdain for anyone not in a car did not speak for many people in my community.

I don’t plan on spending more time on this issue until our budget situation improves, but I do ask that Rice County residents keep it in mind for the future.

In conclusion, here is what I said to the commissioners during my two-minute presentation at the microphone on May 5:

Good morning. I’m Bill Ostrem, a resident of Northfield and chair of the Northfield Area Task Force on Nonmotorized Transportation, which was created by the Northfield city council two years ago.

I thank you for reconsidering this policy and I ask you to put sidewalks and shared-use paths into the “potential county participation” category.  Right now you’re handcuffed by the current policy, which doesn’t allow you to address the full mobility and safety needs of county residents through your capital improvement program.  Making this change gives you the advantage of having a flexible policy that would allow you to address any significant safety issues that you may become aware of. Furthermore, it still gives you the option to say no to adding any costs that you want to avoid. It has all the advantages and none of the disadvantages of the current policy. It also puts you into alignment with the county transportation plan, which includes sections on nonmotorized transportation.

Children and youth, the elderly, disabled people, and others without drivers’ licenses or autos have mobility needs that involve using the public right of way, our roads. Others who want safe options for walking and biking include parents with small children in strollers or on bikes. If they want to walk and bike in our communities they can’t cut through private property, and our urban roads need to reflect that fact with sidewalks and paths. Even rural residents may some day need to retire in our towns and cities and will want safe mobility options.

We have significant problems in the Northfield area alone on county roads that lack these facilities: Woodley Street east, County Road 1, County Road 43 [see picture above]. A flexible policy would allow you to control costs the best way you see fit while still addressing the nonmotorized transportation needs that are a part of the county transportation plan.

Prior to that meeting, I mailed a letter (see below) and copies of the old and current cost participation policy to the commissioners. In the letter I asked them to consider  a simple compromise position: moving the sidewalks and bike paths from the “not eligible” for county participation category to the “potential County participation” category. This is essentially the “case-by-case” funding option that has been discussed as an option.

The transportation committee meetings are not open to the public, but last Friday I called my commissioner, Jeff Docken, to ask what action the committee took. He said that they decided to ask the County Board to consider two options at an upcoming meeting: keeping the current policy or changing it to the “case-by-case” or “potential funding” option that I presented in my letter. I believe he said it would be at a work session, probably May 5, but we should keep an eye on the Board’s agenda for its upcoming meetings.

It remains important for members of the public to let their county commissioner know their views on this subject. Please consider contacting them or writing a letter to the local paper. See below for more information, as well as the text of the letter I submitted.

April 7 County Board Work Session

Several of us advocates spoke again at the April 7 County Board work session, including a Faribault city council member and Jon Denison, a Northfield city council member. During the meeting, two commissioners, Plaisance and Gillen, voiced their strong concerns about funding sidewalks and paths in urban areas. They view the county’s transportation task as maintaining the current road system. Their anxiety is high about being able to maintain the roads in the current budget crisis. They fear having to revert paved roads to gravel roads. Plaisance thinks sidewalks should only be funded by cities through assessment of adjacent residents, though he did say the county may need to be open to helping cities with paths on school property. Gillen voiced his objection to the cost of portions of the Mill Towns Trail, though it is not funded by the county.

Commissioner Malecha is  open to the compromise “case by case” funding option, and Commissioner Docken seems to be open to that as well. The other commissioner, Bauer, did not state a position during the April 7 meeting.

My letter to the County Board

April 13, 2009

Dear Rice County Commissioners,

I would like to address the issue of the Rice County Cost Participation Policy for Cooperative Roadway Construction Projects as it relates to sidewalks and shared-use paths in urban areas, and I’d like to propose a simple compromise solution that I believe would give the county the greatest flexibility in managing its transportation system.

As a Rice County property owner and taxpayer I appreciate the fact that the Board of Commissioners is trying to best use its resources to maintain its large road system, and I understand the extraordinary budgetary pressures the county faces. I also understand that these issues were factors in deciding to change the cost participation policy last summer. However, I do not agree that the new policy fully serves the transportation needs of county residents.

While I would prefer that the county reinstate its previous cost participation policy, I suggest this simple change to the current policy: move “Sidewalks” and “Bituminous Bike Path[s]” to the list of “potential” county participation items. I have enclosed copies of the old and new cost participation policy, with the suggested changes marked in pen.

As I said, these changes would give the county the greatest flexibility in implementing its transportation vision. They would allow the county to work with cities to address the needs of pedestrians, children, bicyclists, the elderly, and the handicapped as they seek to move along and across county roads in urban areas. They would allow the county to address important safety issues and work with school districts, non-profit organizations such as retirement homes, and others to address problem areas. It would allow the county to include sidewalk and path facilities for these groups in its highway capital improvement plan if it makes sense to do so. In many cases plans for such facilities may increase the chances of obtaining additional federal and state grants for transportation projects. Without these changes, the county is severely restricted in its options to address sidewalks and paths.

Furthermore, I suggest changing the term “Bituminous Bike Path” to “Bituminous Shared-Use Path” to reflect the fact that pedestrians, runners, wheelchair users, and inline skaters can use these paths as well as bicyclists. Shared-use path is the term used by MnDOT and other transportation authorities.

The cost participation policy only applies to projects in the County Capital Improvement Plan. In discussing the issue, I believe that the commissioners should know what percentage of the county transportation/highway budget is spent through projects in the capital improvement plan. I ask that they obtain this information from Mr. Luebbe.

Sincerely,

Bill Ostrem, Chair
Northfield Area Task Force on Nonmotorized Transportation
cc: Mr. Weiers, Mr. Luebbe

A group of us will carpool down to Faribault from Northfield and will meet at Northfield city hall’s parking lot around 7:50 am. I invite those interested to join us.

My apologies for the error. I also encourage people to contact the commissioners about the issue and/or write a letter to the local newspaper.