Community Education Resources

Grassroots advocacy begins at the local level, but it’s often hard for advocates to know where to begin or how to build support within the community. Whether you’re trying to build the case for trails, a livable community, safer streets, or promoting bicycle tourism, here are just a few ways you can make a difference in your community:

• Presentations to City Councils or stakeholder groups, tailored to focus on what you’re trying to accomplish

• Workshops to help identify priorities and strategies

• Walk Audits: nothing tells the story more than going for a walk and discovering what the barriers and challenges, along with possible solutions are to building a safer and more accessible community. Would you like to host a walk audit in your community? Check out AARP’s Walk Audit Tool Kit to learn how you can make a change in your town’s walkability/bikeability, right in front of your own doorstep!

• Pop-up traffic calming projects are community-based efforts to see how low-cost and temporary (7– 30 days) versions of street design elements affect the behavior and safety of all people using local streets and roadways.  Here’s a great pop-up planning guide for Montana communities to implement lighter, quicker, and lower-cost complete streets projects, made possible by BWMT, AARP and MSU’s Western Transportation Institute.