The Results are In! How Bike- and Walk-Friendly Is Your Town?

7/15/2014

Bike Walk Connecticut Releases First Ever Town-by-Town Scorecard

Hartford, CT (July 1, 2014) – As part of a new “complete streets” initiative, Bike Walk Connecticut released a first-of-its-kind ranking of the state’s cities and towns on how bike- and walk-friendly they are. Simsbury (1), New Haven (2), New Britain (3), Glastonbury (4), and Middletown (5) claim top honors as the five most bike- and walk-friendly communities. Click here for full results.

The scorecard and rankings are based on an online, statewide public opinion survey that ran this spring and was open to anyone who lives or works in Connecticut. The rankings are also based on municipal leadership and engagement efforts—whether cities or towns have bicycle and pedestrian master plans; citizen task forces or advisory groups; complete streets policies; and whether they have conducted any public outreach efforts related to cycling, walking or complete streets.

The surveys and scorecard are expected to be conducted annually as part of Bike Walk Connecticut’s new five-year initiative to make it safer and easier to walk and bike by implementing “complete streets” in cities and towns across Connecticut. Complete streets make it easier and safer for people to get around on foot or by bike, so they can be more physically active.

Kelly Kennedy, Executive Director of Bike Walk Connecticut, explains that “We want this project to encourage cities and towns to take a really robust approach to complete streets and being bike- and walk-friendly. Being able to get around safely by bike or on foot isn’t just a fad or a health issue or environmental issue. It’s an economic development issue. Towns that are bike- and walk-friendly are great places to live, work, shop and play.” Bike Walk Connecticut has also started to develop an online repository for complete streets resources.

What are Complete Streets?
Complete Streets are streets that are designed to be safe for everyone to use. Complete Streets make it easier and safer to walk and bike to work, to school, to transit, for errands, or just for pleasure and exercise. Connecticut’s Complete Streets law (Conn. Gen. Stat. §13-153f) requires pedestrians, cyclists, and transit users to be routinely considered in the planning, designing, construction and operation of all roads.

About the Project:
This project is made possible through the financial support of the Connecticut Department of Public Health through Cooperative Agreement 1305 from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the purpose of which is to promote statewide implementation of policies and actions to promote health and prevent and control chronic diseases.

About Bike Walk Connecticut:
Bike Walk Connecticut is a statewide, member-supported 501(c)(3) not-for-profit organization that works to make Connecticut a better place to bike and walk. For more information and updates on this Complete Streets Initiative, visit www.bikewalkct.org.

This publication does not express the views of the Connecticut Department of Public Health or the State of Connecticut. The views and opinions expressed are those of the authors.

Bike Walk CT link

7/3/2014 03:33:40 am

Some towns from which we didn't hear on separate survey that asked about their bike ped plans, task forces, outreach efforts, and complete streets policies, have sent some clarifying information about their activities now that the scorecard is out.
We'll post that information here as it comes in.

7/3/2014 03:37:19 am

A Norwalk DPW Engineer reports:
I'm an engineer with Department of Public Works in Norwalk, CT and have been involved in many projects that include pedestrian and bike improvements. They include the Norwalk River Valley Trail, two Safe Routes to School projects and the South Norwalk TOD project which includes many pedestrian and bike improvements.

One thing that I did notice in the report card was that Norwalk didn't respond to the some of the questions. Yes, Norwalk does have a bike and ped study ( it was done by FHI in 2012 and can be viewed on-line) and the City does have a bike and ped task force (started by the Mayor about 2 months ago). We have also done much public outreach on the TOD project and some other studies. Unfortunately, by not responding we significantly affected our score.

Bike Walk CT

7/3/2014 03:49:53 am

We hear from a very involved citizen advocate in Fairfield that:
"Fairfield does have a Bicycle & Pedestrian Plan, a Bicycle & Pedestrian Task Force, a Complete Streets Policy and has engaged in numerous public outreach efforts."

7/3/2014 03:52:01 am

West Hartford's Town Engineer reports:

We have a Master Bike Plan, which was created by a Bicycle Task Force. We also have an active Bicycle Advisory Committee that we have met with on several occasions. We recently received a Bronze Bicycle Friendly Community designation from the League of American Bicyclists.

We also have 300 miles of municipally maintained sidewalks with sidewalk ramps and detectable warning strips. In addition, about 60% of the Town’s traffic signals have exclusive pedestrian phases with countdown pedestrian signal heads. We also have 4 traffic signals with more on the way that feature accessible pedestrian signal equipment to assist blind or visually impaired pedestrians.

7/3/2014 04:08:01 am

Based on some of the questions we've been getting, it seems like some readers thought a "no response" symbol meant their responses to the Bike- Walk-Friendly Public Opinion Survey were not counted. Not so!

To clarify what we said in the media release, Bike-, Walk-Friendly Public Opinion survey results were one part of each town's score. That score appears in the column labeled "Bike Walk Friendly Score (of 100)."

The other part of each town's score comes from a separate survey that went only to town staff and elected officials, not to the public. We used that separate survey to collect information from direct, knowledgeable, official municipal sources about 1) bike ped plans, 2) bike ped task forces, 3) public outreach efforts, and 4) municipal complete streets policies. We received responses to this separate survey from 122 municipalities. Symbols identified in our legend indicate the official municipal response we received on our 4 main questions. An open triangle indicates no official municipal response was received to a particular question.

Comments are closed.

The Results are In! How Bike- and Walk-Friendly Is Your Town?

Topics