The Governor’s Traffic Safety Advisory Commission is honoring the City of Grand Rapids with the Outstanding Traffic Safety Achievement Award. This, in recognition of its nationally heralded Driving Change bicycle safety education campaign.
“You know we’ve been making a lot of improvements over the last 5 to 7 years on bicycling in Grand Rapids and adding the education component has been very important to that change.”
And it’s that education component that just helped the City of Grand Rapids win the state’s outstanding Traffic Safety Achievement Award. Kristin Bennett, is the city’s Transportation Planning and Program Supervisor. She’s says their campaign has used a multi-pronged approach.
“To not only educate people who are riding bicycles but also people who are driving about how to work together out on the roads and improve everyone’s safety.”
And improve they did. Grand Rapids Driving Change Bicycle education program was launched in 2016 and was the first ever public education campaign of its kind in Michigan. Bennett says they have seen fatal and serious injury crash numbers go down.
The Governor’s Traffic Safety Advisory Commission honors organizations, programs and individuals for outstanding contributions to traffic safety. Bennet says this is a big honor for the city, adding they plan to do another campaign this year. The awards ceremony is scheduled for Wednesday, March 21 at the Kellogg Hotel & Conference Center in East Lansing.