How bicycling advocates can strengthen existing partnerships and make strategic alliances that will benefit cyclists, pedestrians, and other vulnerable road users.
As bicycle advocates around the country wait for funding from the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA), Charles Pekow describes the strategies that can help them "take advantage of the new money and rules that can help expand cycling and make it safer."
Noa Banayan, director of federal affairs for People for Bikes, advises bike advocates to seek out existing opportunities and partnerships that will help them leverage more resources for bike improvements. For example, "One of the advantages of the new bill is it requires states with high levels of bike/ped traffic crashes in a given year to spend at least 15 percent of their Highway Safety Improvement Program money on projects to help such 'vulnerable road users.'"
"And since IIJA expands uses of Safe Routes to School (SRS) funding for infrastructure to get students to ride to school and high school education, it would help to coordinate with schools on infrastructure, as increased levels of funding are supposed to become available for Transportation Alternatives and other programs, [League of American Bicyclists policy director Ken] McLeod notes."
Pekow also points to the Rails-to-Trails Conservancy as a potential partner on bike infrastructure, noting that the Conservancy "provides plenty of info on getting IIJA funding for trails at https://www.railstotrails.org/policy/trailstransform/#funding."
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