MassDOT Safe Routes to School program outlines education, encouragement and grant options for Concord schools

Sarah Ashborough, the Safe Routes to School outreach coordinator for the Metro North/North Shore region of Massachusetts, told the Town of Concord Transportation Advisory Committee on April 3 that the MassDOT-funded program combines education, encouragement, engagement, evaluation and engineering to improve student safety and increase active transportation.

"At the very end of the day, we just want the students in the Commonwealth to be safe," Ashborough said, describing the program's emphasis on both safety and promoting walking and biking as modes of travel.

The presentation outlined non-infrastructure work the program provides free to public and charter schools K'12: classroom-based pedestrian and bicycle safety lessons, a skills-based "bike rodeo," arrival-and-dismissal observations, walk audits, parent/guardian travel surveys, and teacher professional-development that can count toward DESE continuing-education credits. Ashborough said there are roughly 1,100 partner schools statewide and multiple local alliance partners such as Bike to School Concord and Mothers Out Front that help with events and outreach.

Ashborough described the program's infrastructure grant streams and timelines: the Signs & Lines grants concentrate on improvements within about a half-mile radius of a school and are intended to be completed within one year; larger infrastructure grants may fund sidewalks, traffic calming, crossing improvements and shared-use paths within a two-mile radius and are typically handled as a multi-year, up-to-five-year scoping, design and construction process. She said the infrastructure grant program has awards that can be up to $2,000,000, though awards vary yearly and many projects are smaller.

"The Signs and Lines grant no consulting needed. Honestly ... it really isn't meant to be a heavy lift," Ashborough said, describing the simpler application for smaller projects. By contrast she said the infrastructure program generally becomes a collaborative, multi-year effort between municipalities and MassDOT because federal and state requirements often apply.

Committee members asked for clarification on what the smaller grants typically cover, whether grants include design and construction, and whether municipalities need to provide a local match. Ashborough said the grants can include both design and construction and that most MassDOT grants do not require a local match, though municipalities generally handle right-of-way, police details and some permitting tasks.

Concord examples included a recent Signs & Lines award for Thoreau Elementary School, work that committee members said has already led to new signs and pavement markings near the school. Ashborough and local volunteers also described recurring encouragement events that Concord runs with schools and partners: International Walk to School Day in October, a winter walk event, and May's Massachusetts Walk, Bike and Roll to School Day, plus walking school buses, route maps and yard-sign campaigns.

Speakers urged better townwide communications to alert neighbors and drivers when larger school walking and biking events concentrate pedestrian and bicycle traffic near schools. Phil Wozner and local volunteers described using school blasts, PTG newsletters and social media to publicize events; a committee member suggested distributing flyers to homes in specific geographic buffers around a school.

Ashborough and the committee discussed data and evaluation tools the program offers, including short parent/guardian travel surveys to establish baseline counts of walking and biking and radius maps to plan walking-school-bus routes. She recommended schools repeat surveys every three to four years to measure trends.

Committee members and members of the public asked about measures for bus and adult driver education; Ashborough said MassDOT materials include a "bike friendly driver" sheet and suggested schools and PTGs can request adult-focused presentations. She also encouraged Concord to form a district Safe Routes task force to coordinate activities across elementary, middle and high schools and stressed equity considerations across program delivery.

Ashborough said she would follow up by sharing links to successful projects, the Thoreau grant materials and the Safe Routes to School statewide web resources.

Concord officials and volunteers at the meeting emphasized that the program is largely collaborative: schools, public works, police, libraries and community groups all take part in planning, events and grant applications. "This is a 50-state undertaking," said Phil Wozner of Bike to School Concord, noting the national Safe Routes Partnership and the recent federal infusion of funding through the bipartisan infrastructure law.