Engaging Community Partners and Youth To Enhance and Sustain Safe Routes to Schools

MacFarlane, Jennifer; Kack, David · 2024 · ROSA P / Montana State University. Western Transportation Institute

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Summary

This report documents the revitalization of Safe Routes to School (SRTS) efforts in Bozeman, Montana, and surrounding areas between February 2023 and September 2024. The project addresses the critical need to increase active transportation among children, a vulnerable road user group, to reduce vehicle emissions, prevent chronic disease, and improve physical health. The initiative was motivated by recent safety tragedies and a decade-long decline in dedicated SRTS funding, which threatened the sustainability of coordinated community efforts. The Western Transportation Institute (WTI) convened a multi-sector partnership including the City of Bozeman, local school districts, law enforcement, and community organizations to implement programming that engages youth and adults in creating safer mobility options. The project employed a collaborative, community-engagement approach centered on four primary goals: creating safer streets, implementing safety education, engaging youth in transportation planning, and securing sustainable funding. Methods included the implementation of Walking School Bus routes, bicycle rodeos, and Walk/Bike to School Days. To foster youth involvement, the team utilized creative engagement tools such as traffic calming art installations, walk audits where students provided feedback through drawing, and artistic activities at community events like bike swaps. Additionally, the project developed educational resources, including a pedestrian safety box for schools, a bicycle rodeo implementation guide, and active transportation maps highlighting safe infrastructure. The team also facilitated carpooling through the School Pool directory and integrated safety education into existing community events like summer lunch programs. Key findings highlight successful implementation and community response. Walking School Bus pilots generated high demand, leading to renewed weekly programs, though staffing constraints eventually paused them. Bicycle rodeos engaged approximately 25 students at one camp and were expanded to multiple schools. Analysis of youth responses to artistic engagement prompts revealed specific desires for infrastructure improvements, categorized into high-cost items like sidewalks, lower-cost items like crosswalks, recreational features, and programming needs such as crossing guards and traffic calming. The project also successfully secured initial budget funding for continued outreach through the City of Bozeman’s FY25 budget. However, the report identifies significant challenges regarding long-term sustainability, noting that school districts lack the staffing capacity for independent coordination and that the expiration of SURTCOM funding threatens ongoing efforts. The significance of this work lies in its demonstration of how creative, youth-centered engagement can revitalize SRTS programs in resource-constrained environments. The report concludes that external coordination support is critical for school districts and that sustainable regional efforts require dedicated funding sources. It recommends the formation of a Metropolitan Planning Organization in the Bozeman area to access Transportation Alternatives funding, similar to models used in other Montana cities, to ensure the long-term viability of safe and equitable mobility options for students.

Key finding

Collaborative community engagement strategies, including walking school buses and youth-informed walk audits, successfully revitalized Safe Routes to School efforts and solicited meaningful youth input, though long-term sustainability remains threatened by funding constraints and staffing limitations.

Methodology

field_study

Provenance

The full processing record for this entry. Every stage of this paper's journey through the pipeline is logged — what ran, with which tool and model, how many attempts it took, and when it last completed. Discovered via bulk_ingest_rosap on 2026-05-23 (6 acquisition events logged).

Summary generated by qwen3.6-27b-prismaquant on 2026-06-10; verification: verified.

Topics

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• traffic safety culture