October 3, 2007 (Montreal, QC) — As part of its “Walk to School” (Marchons vers l’école) program, Velo Quebec invites Quebec school kids to rediscover the pleasure of human-powered locomotion. And after two years of operation, Velo Quebec now reveals how the program is doing.

Aimed at primary school students, Walk to School was launched in 2005 with eight participating schools. By the 2007-2008 school year, some 50 schools””representing 18,500 students–are participating in the program. Including other family members, some 55,000 people are involved. The program will be expanded to the entire province by 2015.

As recently as 1971, 80 percent of Canadian children went to school on foot or by bike, but this percentage has since fallen to about 40 percent. And yet 67 percent of children live within only one kilometre of their school.

Polling of parents at the targeted schools reveals that:

– 80% of parents have heard about the program
– 75% of parents find the program useful
– 60% des parents claim to think about the program;
– 62% des parents have noticed the installation of new bike parking stands at school with 26% actually using them;
– bicycle usership rates have almost doubled at the participating schools (from 5% to 9%)

The busy schedule of families where both the mother and father work is one of two main obstacles to the program. The fear of leaving children in busy streets was cited as another barrier to higher participation.

To overcome these barriers, part of the program involves:

– having school children walk together to school
– having parents taking their children and the children’s friends to school by bike
– rebuilding of certain busy intersections to allow safer pedestrian/cyclist crossings
– bike parking at the schools
– courses on how to safely cycle in traffic are offered to both parents and children