Overview

Safe Routes to School (SRTS) is a federal, state and local effort to enable and encourage children, including those with disabilities, to walk and bicycle to school. SRTS facilitates the planning, development and implementation of projects that improve safety and air quality, as well as reduce traffic and fuel consumption around schools.

Goals
The goals of the SRTS Program are to encourage more students to walk and bike to school where it is safe to do so and to improve the areas where it is not safe.

In New Jersey, we hope to accomplish these goals by providing:

• Funding to schools and communities to improve walking and bicycling conditions to schools through the SRTS Infrastructure Grant Program and
• Assistance to schools and communities with Non-Infrastructure Programs through the New Jersey SRTS Resource Center.

Program Benefits
SRTS programs bring a wide range of benefits to students and the community. These include:

• increasing the health and mobility of school-age children,
• reducing congestion, air pollution and traffic conflicts around schools,
• establishing healthy lifetime habits for students,
• increasing children's independence,
• helping them arrive at school ready to learn, and
• teaching safe pedestrian, bicyclist and driver skills.

The Five E's
The SRTS Program is organized around five complimentary strategies known as the five E's. They are:

• Engineering: Making the environment safer for walking and bicycling
• Encouragement: Encouraging kids to walk and bike to school more often
• Education: Teaching kids and parents safe ways to walk and bike
• Evaluation: Checking to see how many kids are walking and biking as a result of the program or how conditions have improved
• Enforcement: Changing driver, walker and bicyclist behavior as they travel together along the road

Projects that incorporate all five E's are likely to be more effective and sustainable.