(Continued from page 1)

      About half of the 600 Manoa Elementary students live close enough - within
      one mile - to be walkers, yet traffic at the school some mornings can be
      "bedlam," with cars waiting up to 15 minutes to drop off children,
      principal Nancy Donahue said.

      A forthcoming CDC manual suggests strategies to overcome obstacles to
      walking, including:
      Parents can take turns walking small groups of neighborhood children to
      school - which is, among other things, a deterrent to crime, the CDC says.
      A walk through the neighborhood with local public officials can help
      identify safety hazards.
      Bus riders can be dropped off a few blocks from school and walk the last
      stretch as an organized group.

      Some changes, such as the installation of speed bumps and sidewalks, would
      require financing. But the key, CDC officials say, will be changing
      attitudes.

      The school walk "is about engaging parents and children in what should be
      a normal, everyday physical activity," said Dr. Bill Dietz, director of
      the CDC's division of nutrition and physical activity.

      The effort also marks the first time the agency will focus on "community
      change to enhance the physical activity of children," he said.
      "There is not a lot of data or existing programs," Dietz said about this
      kind of approach to preventing chronic disease. "The underlying logic is
      that these environmental changes will promote physical activity."

      CDC officials view the school walk as a rallying point for such diverse
      issues as traffic safety, air pollution and crime. Make the streets safer
      and less smoggy, the thinking goes, and more children will walk to school.

      "It is an idea whose time has come," said Bill Wilkinson, executive
      director of the National Center for Bicycling and Walking, based in
      Washington. "Everybody is primed for it."

      California's transportation department is parceling out $20 million this
      year for a "safe routes to school" construction program. In Atlanta, the
      federal Department of Transportation and the Robert Wood Johnson
      Foundation will be paying $365,000 to set up and evaluate a walk-to-school
      project near 10 elementary schools. Rep. James L. Oberstar of Minnesota,
      the ranking Democrat on the House transportation and infrastructure
      committee, said he planned to secure financing for two new school
      demonstration projects this fall.

      The marquee event, however, is the three-year-old National Walk Our
      Children to School Day, drawing more than 300,000 participants in 142
      cities last fall. That is up from the 1998 turnout of 170,000 participants
      in 58 communities.

      These events have spurred schools to revamp their walking environment,
      according to the University of North Carolina Highway Safety Research
      Center, which monitors the event.

      The 1998 walk prompted Pacific Grove, Calif., to develop a city-wide
      pedestrian master plan.

(Continued on page 3)