It turns out walking and biking to school is way more exciting if all your friends are doing it. It’s even more fun when you get a free pencil that changes colors once you arrive.
That’s how many kids at Peralta Elementary School felt yesterday morning when they joined International Walk & Roll to School Day, a campaign that encourages students, parents, and their caregivers to use green modes of transit.
“We try to get the word out about it every year, and it’s kind of exciting,” said Evan Magers, a Peralta parent who organized the school’s contingent. He walked to school with his daughter, who rollerbladed.
At each school entrance, children were given stickers to add to a board in the courtyard, indicating how they made their way to school. There was a slot for people who walked, another for those who “rolled in” (including cycling), for those who carpooled, used transit, and, finally, those who drove without carpooling. That information will be gathered and sent to the Alameda County Transportation Commission, which will use it to better understand infrastructure needs around schools.
Remy Goldsmith, a spokesperson for the ACTC, said 29 schools registered to participate in the event yesterday.
The program, funded through the county’s Measure BB sales tax, aims to get kids out to enjoy their environment rather than staring at screens while they get driven to school by their parents. A startling statistic on the campaign’s website says that in one generation, the “number of kids walking and bicycling to school has dropped from 71% to 18%.”
Evan Magers, right, was surrounded by kids deliberating on the choice of pencils they would receive for participating in the county’s transit data collection project. Credit: Jose Fermoso/The Oaklandside
International Walk & Roll to School Day began in 1997 in Chicago as National Walk Our Children to School Day, an initiative led by the Partnership for a Walkable America in conjunction with the National Safety Council, a Chicago-based nonprofit organization that advocates for children’s health and safety. The event, which organizers say was modeled on similar efforts in the United Kingdom, quickly expanded nationwide.
In Oakland, the event has been part of the school calendar since 2006. Other school systems in Alameda County have participated for almost as long, with support from the county’s Safe Roads to School Program.
Dozens of students at the Rockridge elementary school participated. According to Magers, the kids were obsessed with the purple pencils that changed to pink when rubbed.
“Once the purple ones are gone—watch out,” he said.
Some students bounced around trading the pencils, while others used them as pretend swords or carefully placed them inside their tiny backpacks.
Most kids and their families walked to Peralta Elementary School for the special event. Credit: Jose Fermoso/The Oaklandside
Once all the kids had put their stickers up on the board, it became clear that most of the students — 96 of them — had walked. Another 45 rolled in on wheels, such as a bike or scooter. Three came in using mass transit, while eight carpooled and 47 kids were driven in by car.
Matt Glaser told us that he has been taking his kids to Peralta for the last four years through a mix of biking, walking, and driving. An avid cyclist throughout his life, Glaser created a map a few years ago for other parents outlining the safest routes around the school. Like many Oakland elementary schools, Peralta is surrounded by dangerous arterials — in this case Telegraph, Shattuck, and Alcatraz avenues.
“ I’m one of those folks who believes that any amount of biking, if you can do it, once a month or a couple times a month is great,” he said. “One of the things I noticed when I was talking to parents about why they don’t ride or walk is that they didn’t feel very safe crossing certain intersections or on certain streets.”
Glaser said that even with his cycling experience, his kids have taken some time to get comfortable biking in the area.
If more parents and kids use the same routes, as denoted on his map, Glaser said, walking or biking to school would become much safer, as there is “safety in numbers.” That’s the same idea behind the “walking school buses” that other Oakland parents have created, where whole families walk together to school.
The color-changing pencils were a hot item during this year’s National Walk & Roll to School Day. Credit: Jose Fermoso/The Oaklandside
Three years ago, The Oaklandside found that parents who took their kids to school on a road off International Avenue chose to drive them instead of walking, even when they lived only a few blocks away, simply because they considered it much safer.
In recent years, the city has been adding and improving road infrastructure around schools, which has helped slow traffic, including investing in safer crossings. Part of it, city transportation officials have said, is about equity: they prioritize projects in areas with the most children and that have been historically underserved.
This morning, most of the kids and parents we talked to said their school felt pretty safe to walk or bike to, as it is tucked into a residential neighborhood. One parent told us that their whole family used to walk to school together when both of their kids attended Peralta, but that it’s become harder as the kids get older and go to separate schools, often leading them to drive.
“Depending on where you live, walking can cause some anxiety,” that parent said. “We could use more signage for when you have to cross during your walking commute. I don’t think you need a crossing guard at every intersection, but better crosswalks, as some are faded.”
The parent said that dedicated left turns and “no turn on red” signs would help encourage people to slow down and avoid hitting kids as they cross.
Magers told us that for last year’s International Walk & Roll to School Day, Peralta parents held a bike drive that brought in more than 100 donated bikes that parents gave to the Berkeley Waterside Workshop, which then fixed them up and gave them to Oakland kids who didn’t have one. He said he looked forward to doing that again in the future.
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