Sunday, November 17, 2013

Montclair is named a Silver Level Walk Friendly Community (Yeah!)

Sorry this post is a little late as internet access can be hard to come by in the wilds of Idaho.

The FHWA's Pedestrian and Bicycle Information Center (PBIC) located in Chapel Hill, NC has named Montclair a Walk Friendly Community and awarded it a Silver level designation.  Montclair joins New Jersey's only other Walk Friendly Community Hoboken, which was awarded an impressive Gold level two years ago.

According to the PBIC news release:
Montclair is designated as a Silver-level community due to its commitment to enforcing pedestrian laws and safety, outstanding participation in Safe Routes to School programs, and impressive traffic calming projects. The township’s density and transit-oriented design provides a great foundation for promoting walkability!
For more on why Montclair was given this award  take a look at this PBIC webpage explaining the award.  Also take a look at the page explaining Hoboken's Gold award.

Congratulations Montclair on this well deserved award!  Fortunately for New Jersey, Montclair is not so unusual as our state is blessed with many dozens of older "Main Street" communities.  There is really no reason why many more could not win this award if they would only apply.  Let's make New Jersey the Walk Friendly Community leader with more WFC's than any other state in the nation!

1 comment:

DP Quinn said...

Really ????
After years of traversing up hill from the lower depths of Montclair to the top, I would give it a cranberry at most. Not to mention the horrendous snow mountains w/inaccessible bus stops and crosswalks the past few months.