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Door County Walks

Increasing walkability means different things to different people. For the city planner, it means creating safe routes around town for people on foot. For the principal, it means encouraging students to walk to school. For the fitness advocate, it means having people walk together to make exercise fun.

Matthew Luders writes questions for the panel at the America Walks workshop. Photo by Carol Thompson

About 40 people from around the county met at Prince of Peace Lutheran Church in Sturgeon Bay on May 30 to talk about increasing walkability in Door County, thanks to an America Walks grant the Door County YMCA recently received.

“We see [walking] as a great way to serve the community,” said Cindy Weber, YMCA president of mission development. “Anything we can do to encourage people to get up and move more, we want to do that.”

The grant covered the day-long walkability workshop, facilitated by America Walks executive director Scott Bricker and consultant Jeremy Grandstaff, and further advice on future projects. After hours of discussing ideas and listening to a panel of local walking experts, workshop participants decided to focus on four initiatives:

• Encouraging more walking in the workplace by creating groups that could meet before or after work or on lunch breaks.

• Developing more walking tourism-based activities, like docent- or self-guided walking tours around historic areas.

• Getting more students walking to school by building momentum around the “safe routes to school” initiative and educating parents and students about the benefits of walking.

• Building awareness of walking opportunities that already exist.

Ashley Lusk started a walking group in the winter of 2011 to help get people out of the house in the chilly dark months. Walking her dog was Lusk’s favorite part of the day, and she wanted to share the joy.

“It makes it easier when you have people to meet, it goes by so much faster,” Lusk said. “A lot of women are afraid to go walking at night, they can’t do it before work and don’t want to do it after work because they don’t feel comfortable.”

Lusk publicizes her group and opens it up to anyone who wants to join, but she said it’s the social connections that really get people to join. People are more likely to join their friends for a walk, so people who are enthusiastic about making a “walkable” community need to get out and lead by example.

“I feel a little concerned we’re going to be gung ho and excited about walking, and people will think it’s a great idea but they’re not going to get off the couch and meet the walking groups,” Lusk said. “My only concern is actually getting people to follow through.”

That concern leads to the crux of the issue, according to Brickner. How do we turn interest into action?

One of the key questions discussed at the America Walks workshop was whether building more walking paths would lead to more walking, or if more walkers are needed to warrant more sidewalks or trails. Some advocated for first building more sidewalks so people can walk to facilities like grocery stores and pharmacies, but Sturgeon Bay Schools District Administrator Joe Stutting saw the issue from a political side.

“If the mindset is there and you see bikers and you see walkers, it’s going to be easier for us to make decisions [to invest in sidewalks and trails],” Stutting said. “I would love to see the volume first to justify the expense.”

Weber said she left the workshop happy to see that people are concerned about walking in Door County.

“I loved the engagement of everybody that was there,” Weber said. “We had people that were just citizens that came forward and helped with the discussion process, and the brainstorming. It was a mix of government, nonprofit and individuals, and it was nice to see that everybody really cared about the health and wellbeing of our community.”

But the work isn’t over. Now that the workshop and discussions have taken place, Weber and the rest of the planning team need to work on getting Door County to walk. They plan to partner with existing organizations such as the Door County Land Trust and Healthy Door County 2020 to get projects off the ground.

“We still need more people in the community to help us move these things forward,” Weber said. “We’ll probably do some sort of public forum and try to get more involvement throughout the community.”

And involvement, just like “walkability,” means different things to different people. It could even mean just getting out for a walk.