The City of Santa Clarita has been awarded a $450,000 grant from the State of California Department of Transportation for the Safe Routes to School (SRTS) program to help create a safe and healthy environment where students can walk or bike to school.
Grant funds will be used to construct improvements around Plum Canyon, Mountainview, and Fair Oaks Ranch elementary schools to promote alternative means of transportation.
The Safe Routes program encourages children to walk and bike to school by creating safer transportation routes through funding projects that remove the barriers that currently prevent students and families from walking or biking. Not only does this program encourage a safe and healthy active lifestyle, it reduces traffic, fuel consumption, and air pollution in the vicinity of schools.
“For six consecutive years, the City of Santa Clarita has secured grant funding for the Safe Routes to School program, supporting programs aimed at increasing our kids’ ability to walk and bike to school safely,” says Mayor Frank Ferry. “This grant funding is spread across the community with one school benefiting each year within each school district.”
The City plans to move forward with infrastructure improvements during the summer of 2013. Specific improvements being constructed will include curb extensions to slow vehicles and reduce crossing distances, speed feedback displays to alert motorists to vehicle speeds, raised crosswalks to reduce vehicle speeds, and ladder-style crosswalk marking to increase visibility.
The City has been awarded seven SRTS grants for infrastructure improvements around 21 elementary schools in the Newhall, Saugus, and Sulphur Springs Districts, for a total amount of approximately $3.4 million. In addition, the City has previously been awarded $295,000 for a SRTS non-infrastructure grant.
For more information, please contact the Senior Traffic Engineer Ian Pari at (661) 284-1402 or visit santa-clarita.com.