RICHMOND—The Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT) is accepting School Travel Plans for the Safe Routes to School (SRTS) Program’s 2011 grant cycle from localities interested in making bicycling and walking to school safer and more appealing to students.    

The Safe Routes to School program, funded by the U.S. Department of Transportation's Federal Highway Administration, seeks to improve walking and bicycling opportunities for children in grades K-8 through engineering, encouragement, education and enforcement activities. Funding is available for infrastructure improvement projects such as traffic calming, pedestrian and bicycle facilities, traffic control devices and sidewalk improvements. At this time, VDOT is not accepting applications for non-infrastructure improvements, but plans to continue that portion of the grant program in the future. 

The deadline for localities to submit a final version of their School Travel Plans is April 29, 2011. Applicants interested in receiving comments and suggestions on their travel plans prior to final submission must send them to VDOT by March 25, 2011, for review. The final infrastructure grant application deadline is June 3, 2011, for those applicants that receive notice from the VDOT SRTS coordinator that their travel plan has been approved. Deadline for Travel Plan Submission is April 29, 2011.

Program guidelines and other resources are available on the VDOT website at  www.virginiadot.org/saferoutes.  School travel plans can be sent to Robert Williams, VDOT Safe Routes to School coordinator, at RobertJ.Williams@VDOT.Virginia.Gov.