Where the Rubber Meets the Road: Promoting Active Transportation in Rural Areas

Please join us for this interactive Web Forum

Tuesday, April 24

12:30 PM to 1:45 PM Pacific Daylight Time

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There are unique barriers to active modes of transportation in rural communities. Rural environments typically lack pedestrian facilities and bike lanes; stores, schools, jobs, and services are sometimes located far apart from homes; and parks and recreation facilities are rare. In addition, some small town and rural residents see "active transportation" - the ability for people to be physically active in the course of daily life, e.g. walking to school or the supermarket or bicycling to work - as out of place in the rural context.

Understanding these barriers is the first step towards finding opportunities to remove them. In fact, the active living movement is gaining momentum in small towns, rural and tribal communities in every region of the US. This Web Forum will feature a frank roundtable discussion of how, through persistence and inspiration, small towns can implement policies, programs, and environmental changes that support walking and biking. Learn about strategies, tools, and resources that you can use to improve your community so that children and adults can be more physically active and healthier on a daily basis.

Join us for what will surely be a dynamic and thought-provoking forum on how rural communities can support walking and biking. Unlike our traditional events, this Web Forum will feature an entirely unscripted, round table conversation with five leaders in the field of promoting Active Transportation. We look forward to your comments and questions to help shape our open discussion.

Prior to the Web Forum, we invite you to read the report Active Transportation Beyond Urban Centers: Walking and Bicycling in Small Towns and Rural America.

Sponsored by Active Living Research and the Public Health Institute

PRESENTERS

Eric Oberg
Manager
Trail Development
Rails-to-Trails Conservancy

Jennifer Rice
Director
Community Strategies
Humboldt Area Foundation

Ronald Cossman, PhD
Associate Research Professor
Research Fellow
Social Science Research Center

Mark Duncan
President
Starkville in Motion

MODERATOR

Tracy Hadden Loh
Director
National Transportation Enhancements Clearinghouse
Rails-to-Trails Conservancy