EVERYBODY OUT OF THE CAR POOL!

The Burlington Free Press
October 7, 2004
By Molly Walsh

SOUTH BURLINGTON It's 6:45 a.m. and Stephen Weibust is ready to begin his 55-minute commute to work. He leaves his Volvo in the driveway and points his sneakers northward in the fresh, autumn air.

Weibust walks the six-mile round-trip from his suburban home on Greening Avenue to Edmunds Middle School in downtown Burlington every day. The 54-year-old music teacher normally makes the trip alone, but Wednesday he had company and lots of it.

Seventeen teachers and students joined Weibust on his daily trek. They arrived singly and in pairs as he power-stepped out of his quiet neighborhood onto U.S. 7, past the congested Interstate 189 entry ramp, and eventually onto South Union Street. The reason for the march: to celebrate Weibust's walking commitment and partake in the International Walk to School Day.

The annual event encourages students and faculty to walk or ride bicycles to school. The goals are to reduce auto-related air pollution and counter the national weight gain.
Weibust is a human billboard for the walk-to-school movement. He's lost 30 pounds since he began walking the three miles to school in September of 2003.

"Oh, I feel a thousand times better," he said in mid-step. "Your mind feels better. Standing up I can reach down and tie my shoes now."

At least 31 Vermont schools and 4,500 students participated in Wednesday's Walk to School Day, according to the Vermont Agency of Transportation. The ranks have steadily increased since 2001, when eight Vermont schools and 1,000 students participated.
In this era it's unusual for a Vermont child to walk to school. Most Vermont students ride in buses or cars to the school door. A few Chittenden County districts have significant numbers of walkers Burlington, Essex Junction and Winooski, for example but they are exceptions.

The state's public schools spend around $30 million annually for school buses, according to the Vermont Agency of Transportation. In many school districts walking isn't feasible. Homes are miles from school and there are no sidewalks to separate children from congested roads.

At Camels Hump Middle School in Richmond, 99 percent of students arrive by bus or car, said principal Robert Goudreau. The school is one of three in Chittenden County that are participating in a two-year pilot program called Safe Routes to School.

The goal is to identify and reduce obstacles to walking and cycling obstacles that are many, said Goudreau.
"We have a housing development that pretty much abuts the school," Goudreau said, "but the development has no sidewalks. How can you encourage those kids to walk to school?"

Goudreau believes modest increases in the walking population are possible but he does not expect the Safe Routes program to eliminate the need for school buses. He supports the walk-to-school movement anyway.

"If it does nothing else, it hopefully raises parents' awareness that we've gotta quit raising couch potato kids," Goudreau said.

Statistics portray the United States as an increasingly pudgy nation home to pudgy children. The percentage of overweight people between the ages of 6 and 19 increased from about 4 percent in 1974 to 15 percent in 2000, according to the National Center for Health Statistics. Another 15 percent of people in this age group were at risk of being overweight in 2000.

Jon Kaplan, assistant bicycle and pedestrian coordinator at the Vermont Agency of Transportation, attributes growing participation in the Walk to School Day to publicity about childhood obesity.

While encouraged by the interest in the walk-to-school movement, Kaplan thinks it will take years to address the broad trends that make walking unrealistic for many children.
In the meantime people like Weibust are walking. He's grown so addicted that sometimes he'll detour up a hill or into a neighborhood to add extra steps onto his 12,000-step, two-hour-a-day routine.

A day without walking is a rare day for Weibust. True, he missed three days last winter after he broke his wrist in an encounter with a snowbank (despite the throbbing pain he completed the walk to school). Even in bitter cold the Volvo rarely leaves the driveway.
"If it's 20 below I might not walk. But 10, 15 below?" Weibust scoffed. "You tend to actually get sweaty under your coat."

Contact Molly Walsh at 660-1874 or mwalsh@bfp.burlingtonfreepress.com
Box: Safe Routes to School

Three Chittenden County schools are participating in a two-year pilot project called Safe Routes to School: Camels Hump Middle School in Richmond, Hinesburg Community School and C.P. Smith Elementary in Burlington.

The program, sponsored by the Chittenden County Metropolitan Planning Organization, will include surveys of parents and students, and a study of the barriers to walking and cycling to school.