Movement Grows to Get Us Out of Our Cars
By Laurie Blake, Minneapolis Star Tribune

New efforts in the metro area will encourage more walking and biking.

Courtesy Minneapolis Star Tribune - http://www.minnesotacyclist.com/news/newsarticle.php?id=72&archives=yes

With hundreds of miles of off-road trails, Minnesota is already a national leader in recreational biking and walking. But that is no longer enough.

Concerned about obesity and worried about higher gasoline prices and global warming, people are pushing for more day-to-day walking and biking options.

Community workshops on strategies for making it safer and more inviting to walk or bike are drawing some of the largest crowds in the country. A few developments friendly to walking and biking have been built in the past five years.

Now two new programs will aim millions of dollars at getting Twin Cities residents out of their cars.

“We are hearing that people want a more active lifestyle,” said Lynn Moratzka, Dakota County transportation planner. In the past, people wanted to drive and be in their cars, Moratzka said. “Now what is appealing is getting back to the small-town ability to walk and bike to activities within their community without having to get into their car.”

Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota is behind one of the pushes for active living. Using $1.5 million from the state’s tobacco settlement, the health insurance company is awarding grants to pay for revised development plans in as many as 20 selected cities and counties to make it safe, convenient and inviting for people to do daily activities without a car.

A half-hour a day

With the goal of building in at least 30 minutes of physical activity into daily routines, three metro counties are working to identify barriers that keep people from walking and biking. Dakota County is working with Apple Valley, Rosemount and Eagan; Hennepin County is working with Eden Prairie, St. Louis Park and Bloomington, and Ramsey County is working with as many cities as are interested. Once they identify the barriers, they will revise city plans that guide development and remove them.

In a shorter-term initiative, Minneapolis and connecting cities have been chosen to receive a $21.5 million federal grant to find out to what extent spending on planning, physical improvements and public education will increase bicycling and walking. About 17 percent of all trips in Minneapolis are already made by bike and on foot. Over the next three years Transit for Livable Communities will use the federal money for more trails, bike racks and public education campaigns to boost the number further.

“A large percentage of trips are still made by car that are under two miles,” said Steve Clark, manager of the bike and walk program for Transit for Livable Communities. “When we do surveys we still find that a lot of people would bike or walk if it was safer or more pleasant.” While Minneapolis already has a lot of bike amenities, there “are still a lot of areas where you can’t go from point A to point B without having considerable challenge,” Clark said.

Timing is good

All metro-area cities are required by the Metropolitan Council to update development plans by the end of 2008. The timeline is spreading active-living ideas, said Falcon Heights Mayor Sue Gehrz. Whether they have Blue Cross grants or not, a lot of cities are asking, “What can we do to help people save energy, save gas, help the environment and be healthier?”

Blue Cross-Blue Shield has provided leadership and funding for the wave of community planning as part of its $241 million Prevention Minnesota campaign to reduce smoking, increase physical activity and improve the eating habits.

Bloomington is one of the first eight cities to land a Blue Cross-Blue Shield grant. The city has hired a consultant to develop a strategy to make it easier and safer to get around without cars.

“I can’t remember anything like this 10 years ago,” said Eileen O’Connell, a public health planner for Bloomington. “There has been this slow growth of the realization that communities are more than just freeways.”

In Edina, adults want to be able to ride their bikes to Southdale for dinner and a movie or out to coffee, and they want safe routes for their kids, said Steve Rusk, a cyclist who chairs an Edina task force focusing on improved biking. Bike routes must be marked by signs and served by bike parking, Rusk said. “I would like to see my city support the bicycle as a transportation mode as much as they support automobiles.”

To the north, using a Blue Cross grant, the Arrowhead region is pushing the active living agenda. At the Arrowhead Regional Development Commission in Duluth, Andy Hubley said his agency will meet with cities and encourage elected officials to require sidewalks to be kept free of snow, insist that developers build sidewalks or trails in new developments and adopt plans and, ultimately, budgets for city networks of sidewalks and trails.

Minnesota is leading the country in miles of bike and walking trails, and all that trail development means that people like to bike and walk, Hubley said.

“But the thing that I have always been disappointed in is that their connectivity to neighborhoods isn’t very good. Now the next step is to get that integrated back into the neighborhoods so they don’t have to drive to go do it.”

Laurie Blake • 612-673-1711 • lblake@startribune.com

Article Published: 03-06-2007