Evaluating the Safe Routes to School (SR2S) Transportation Program in Socially Vulnerable Communities in San Diego County, California

Frequent vehicle collisions involving pedestrians or bicyclists indicate that there are opportunities to improve safe walking or biking. Concerns for child safety are among the strongest impediments to children walking or biking to school, but for some, walking or bicycling to school is a necessity due to financial or other circumstances. In fact, walking or biking to school is more than twice as common among students from low-income households than students from higher-income households. Creating safe routes is one key mechanism to achieve social equity goals by providing safe opportunities to walk and bike regardless of a community’s socio-economic composition. The Safe Routes to School (SR2S) program is a federally funded initiative developed by the US Department of Transportation (DOT) since 2005 to foster opportunities for students to walk and bike to school safely and routinely. It is important to understand how this program can be evaluated and especially how socially vulnerable communities are benefited from this program. This project will select 2-5 schools located in socially vulnerable communities in San Diego County to evaluate the impacts of the Safe Routes to School programs for each school and identify accident (injuries and fatalities) hot spots for the future routing improvement, develop and design a SR2S web-based visualization tool for easy road safety monitoring and reporting, conduct VR educational road safety training for children, and strengthen community collaboration across San Diego County.

• Record URL:
  https://safed.vtti.vt.edu/projects/evaluating-the-safe-routes-to-school-sr2s-transportation-program-in-socially-vulnerable-communities-in-san-diego-county-california/

Language

• English

Project

• Status: Active
• Funding: $376000
• Contract Numbers:

  69A3551747115

• Sponsor Organizations:

  Office of the Assistant Secretary for Research and Technology

  University Transportation Centers Program
  Department of Transportation
  Washington, DC  United States  20590
• Managing Organizations:

  Safety through Disruption University Transportation Center (Safe-D)

  Virginia Tech Transportation Institute
  Blacksburg, VA  United States  24060
• Project Managers:

  Glenn, Eric

• Performing Organizations:

  San Diego State University

  5500 Campanile Dr
  San Diego, CA  United States  92182
• Principal Investigators:

  Fernandez, Gabriela

• Start Date: 20220115
• Expected Completion Date: 20230615
• Actual Completion Date: 0
• USDOT Program: University Transportation Centers

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Bicycling; Communities; Equity; Highway safety; Low income groups; Pedestrian safety; Routes; Safety programs; School children; Walking
• Identifier Terms: Safe Routes to School (Program)
• Geographic Terms: San Diego County (California)
• Subject Areas: Education and Training; Highways; Pedestrians and Bicyclists; Safety and Human Factors; Society;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01835323
• Record Type: Research project
• Source Agency: Safety through Disruption University Transportation Center (Safe-D)
• Contract Numbers: 69A3551747115
• Files: UTC, RIP
• Created Date: Feb 7 2022 9:42AM