Advertisement These are a few things that would make the La Crosse area more walkable and bicycle friendly, according to Mark Fenton, a national walking advocate who helps communities promote physical activity through programs, projects and policy changes.
Fenton was in La Crosse last week and presented his recommendations to business leaders about how communities can proceed with making changes that will lead to more people walking and biking.
Here are his eight recommendations:
-- Build a interdisciplinary leadership team to lead the changes.
-- Promote and market the existing assets such as bike trails and walking along the river. Put up signs pointing people to those assets. Highlight downtown destinations. Use hotels, restaurants and stores to spread the word. Aggressively promote the transit system by offering free ride days, take a friend day, employee packages and enhanced schedules.
-- Launch an employer-driven active community program. Encourage employees to walk, bike and use the bus. Offer places to park bikes and set up a program in which employees can earn health premium discounts and vacation days for physical activity.
-- Institutionalize a communitywide “safe routes to school” program. Create local plans that involve all schools, develop safe routes and enforce proper speeds.
-- Complete a regional trail system focusing on local connections to neighborhoods and shops. Focus on destinations and tie it into sidewalks, bike lanes and a transit network. Highlight the tie-in to the Mississippi River Trail.
-- Embrace and institutionalize the details of an active living design. Work on zoning code changes that must be applied to everyone.
-- Implement a complete streets policy. Take into account pedestrians, cyclists and transit users all the time.
-- Tackle the big, scary stuff. Have people pay for parking, turn some one-way streets downtown into two-ways streets and create more affordable residential opportunities downtown.
Fenton said La Crosse has done some amazing things, but “you’re at a critical turning point.”
It’s now up to the local Pioneering Healthier Communities Team to do its work and make sure some programs, projects and policies are created to change the environment and encourage physical activity, biking and walking.
Fenton recommended that all planning commission members ask four questions when considering development: Are destinations within walking and biking distance? Are there sidewalks, trails, bike lanes and crossings? Are there inviting settings for bikes and pedestrians? Is it safe and accessible?
All are good things to remember.
