Phase 1 Engagement: Preparing to Engage and Early Awareness

Phase 1 engagement was designed to develop the communications and engagement materials and protocols that would support engagement over the life of the project. Work involved development of an engagement plan, branding for the project to make it easily recognizable across all communications platforms, development of a website and social media channels, creation of an extensive contacts database, and securing commitments from communication partners to support ongoing project communications, particularly social media.

Public engagement launched with mass email announcements, social media messages, and tabling at local events through the summer and fall of 2019. Tabling at hightraffic locations was a productive way to raise awareness for the planning effort and collect early feedback from the public.

Tabling was conducted at these community locations during the summer and fall of 2019.

• The Pavilion at Lemay

• Greentree Festival, Kirkwood

• Life Outside Festival, St. Vincent County Park

• St. Louis Community College, Wildwood Health Expo

• Ferguson Community Center

• Ferguson Health and Safety Fair

• Ferguson Farmer’s Market

Phase 2 Engagement: Issue and Needs

The County focused Phase 2 engagement on gathering input on needs, opportunities, and preferences for walking and biking. The project experienced its highest level of engagement during this phase, reaching hundreds of people through four public meetings and an online survey.

Activities

Public Meetings

Four public meetings were held throughout the County with combined attendance of 92 people. Displays showed residents information about existing conditions of the County’s transportation system; there were several opportunities for meeting participants to provide input, including a survey and interactive money game where attendees could spend imaginary money on walking and biking priorities.

Online Community Survey

An online survey was launched along with promotion of the public meetings to gather input from County residents on their preference for walking and biking.

Online Mapping Tool

To encourage participation via the project website, the County developed an online mapping tool for community residents to share their input on current conditions for walking and biking, including preferred routes, popular destinations, and locations in need of improvement.

WHAT WE HEARD Public Meeting Input

Phase 2 offered several opportunities for in-person engagement including public meetings and tabling at local events. These opportunities were continued from Phase 1.

Feedback received from in-person engagement aligns with survey results. Residents showed interest in improving existing sidewalks, adding more sidewalks, and adding off-road and on-road bicycle facilities.

One of the engagement activities offered at both public meetings and tabling events was a spending priorities game. Participants were invited to allocate pretend “Action Plan Dollars” to proposed improvements indicating which improvements were most important to them. While the game didn’t result in significant differentiation among the options, the top choices were consistent with survey results: more sidewalks, improvements to existing sidewalks, and more off-road bike facilities.

Table 4. Public Meeting Spending Priorities

Another activity available at the public meetings involved evaluating Action Plan values. The draft values presented had been developed by the Core Team to be guiding principles for development of the Action Plan. Safety was the most popular option by a considerable margin, which is consistent with the public’s interest in separated facilities for both walking and biking. Following Safety, the most popular values were Consistency & Reliability, Equity, and All Ages & Abilities.

Online Community Survey

With 906 participants, the online community survey was the most utilized public engagement tool for the Action Plan. Data collection took place over a four-month period, September through December of 2019.

Overall Survey Results. Walking and biking are important to survey respondents’ quality of life. Seventyfour percent of survey respondents said walking improvements were important or very important to their quality of life. Coincidentally, 74% of survey respondents said biking improvements were important or very important to their quality of life.

Survey respondents felt the most important factors to consider when setting priorities for improvements were:

• Demand, investing in routes with the most desire for walking and biking (40%),

• Efficiency, investing as opportunities arise through roadway projects (28%).

• Other responses included investing equally across St. Louis (18%) and investing most in areas where car ownership is low (7%).

Survey Results Related to Biking. The comfort of survey respondents increases as the level of separation between bikes and cars increases. Only 15% of respondents felt comfortable sharing the road with drivers on a street with heavy traffic, while 97% reported feeling comfortable on a greenway and 93% feel comfortable on a protected path next to the road.

Reflecting the preference for more separate facilities, respondents indicated they would ride more if:

• There were more off-street areas for bicycles like greenways and trails (75%)

• Intersections felt safer to cross (59%)

• There were more designated on-street areas for bicycles like bike lanes (56%)

Survey Results Related to Walking. Survey respondents would walk more if:

• There were more destinations nearby (60%)

• Intersections felt safer to cross (60%)

• There were more sidewalks (59%).

Phase 2 Engagement Evaluation

Equity Audits were an essential component of the Action Plan’s overall engagement strategy which recognized the need to combine tactics designed to reach a lot of people, with those designed to reach targeted groups less likely to participate.

Of particular concern to St. Louis County was the ability to engage communities in which there are higher concentrations of disadvantaged populations who rely on walking, bicycling, and transit as primary modes of travel. Geographies in which these disadvantaged populations represent a significant proportion of area residents were initially identified in the Equity Analysis conducted as part of the existing conditions analysis and include people of color, youth, senior citizens, people living below 200% of the poverty line, people with limited English proficiency, and households with no access to a motor vehicle.

As anticipated, tactics utilized to generate participation from the general public during Phase 2 were successful in that they reached a wide audience - more than 1,000 people participated in activities that included the online survey, tabling at large events and public meetings. However, as is often the case and was anticipated here, these activities left significant gaps in participation that required targeted outreach tactics and review of overall engagement strategy.

Based on data around the effectiveness of Phase 2 engagement strategies, the project team observed these key findings:

• Survey results show higher participation in the West (34%) and Central (36%) Planning Areas and lower participation in the North (11%) and South (10%) Planning Areas. Public meeting attendance mirrored this pattern.

• Survey results are disproportionately white (82%), with black/African Americans (5%), Hispanic (2%), and Asian (1%) groups underrepresented when compared to the County population as a whole - White (68.2%), black/African American (24.9%), Hispanic or Latino (3%) and Asian (4.5%).

• Almost all (97%) of survey respondents report driving as one of their modes of travel and most of those (89%) report driving as their primary mode of transportation. In comparison, only 93% of households in St. Louis County have a vehicle or vehicles and likely rely on walking, bicycling, and transit.1 Of those who do walk and bike, the most frequently reported reason by far was health/exercise/relaxation as opposed to more functional reasons such as commuting to work or transit.

• Across all areas there was low engagement from senior citizens (over 70) and youth/young adults (Under 29), compared to other age ranges.

In order to fill the engagement gaps identified in the Equity Audit, the County conducted stakeholder interviews with community organizations offering insight into the needs of specific populations. The project team conducted five interviews with stakeholder groups representing underserved communities and other populations not represented through previous engagement efforts. These stakeholder groups included Generate Health, Beyond Housing, Ferguson-Florissant School District, Hancock Place School District, University Square, and University of Missouri-St. Louis students. Through these stakeholder interviews, the project team learned about specific transportation needs and challenges, including safe pedestrian facilities along major corridors, access to transit, safe routes to school, and access to community services and parks.

1 U.S. Census Bureau; American Community Survey, 2019 American Community Survey 5-Year Estimates, Table B08201.

Beyond stakeholder interviews, the County considered conducting engagement strategies such as transit center intercept surveys and strengthening overall engagement outreach through grassroots tactics like handing out flyers or hanging door hangers to advertise public meetings. These strategies were not able to move forward due to COVID-19, which prevented almost all face-to-face contact.

The virtual open house included an interactive map where attendees

could offer location-specific feedback

Phase 3 Engagement: Draft Plan Review

Phase 3 engagement focused on gathering input on the draft network and programming and policy recommendations. The feedback received during this phase of engagement provided the project team with valuable information necessary to refine draft recommendations to better reflect the values and desired outcomes of community residents, stakeholders, and local agency partners. Due to COVID-19 restrictions and the desire to promote public health and safety, St. Louis County shifted its engagement approach to connect with residents and stakeholders through online and virtual platforms.

Activities

The interactive map generated a 338 different projects proposed for Strong support was received for roadways including: sidepaths along proposed sidewalk along Ballas Road, bikeways along Ballas and Big Bend

Virtual Open House & Zoom Webinar

Map users also commented on MoDOT which fall outside the purview of those comments will be shared with highlight the need for ongoing cooperation bicycle and pedestrian network.

A two-week long virtual open-house paired with a live Zoom webinar proved a very successful alternative to in-person meetings. Almost 1,900 people visited the virtual open house, more than 400 people completed the online survey, over 125 people joined the Zoom webinar, and over 1,000 comments on the draft plan map were submitted. By keeping the virtual open house accessible for a two-week period, the County was able to engage with more residents than might typically be able to attend a traditional open house in person.

Virtual Open House Participation By The Numbers

Virtual engagement was used rather than in-person meetings due to COVID-19 and proved a great County residents. A virtual open house was available for just over two weeks from July 24 to August held on Wednesday, July 29 to complement the virtual open house; a recording of the live meeting open house page.

ABOUT PARTICIPANTS

Visitors to the virtual open house page

1,874 Completed online surveys

122

Attendees to online event

438

1,172

Comments to network map

As we seek Louis County that some perspectives in our virtual intentional and Under-represented

• African-Americans

• North and

• Transit

• Functional on walking rather than

We will be reaching community receive feedback of St. Louis

What Happens Next

•Draft Plan Document Completed, Communication Protocol Developed for Implementation Projects – Fall 2020

•Final Plan for Walking and Biking is approved by County Council

•Implementation begins!

Local Agency Network Review Meetings

To support municipal collaboration and input on the draft network recommendations, St. Louis County held two virtual meetings with local agency representatives. These meetings provided local agencies with an overview of the network development process and the draft recommendations for pedestrian and bicycle improvements. The input provided by local agencies through these meetings and through follow-up meetings with individual municipalities provided guidance for the project team to revise plan recommendations to better connect to local active transportation networks and reflect local communities’ values and desires for walking and biking.

Midland Blvd Demonstration Project

In mid-October of 2020, the Action Plan Core Team installed a temporary bike lane and crosswalk demonstration project on Midland Boulevard adjacent to Heman Park in University City. The temporary installation served two main purposes. First, it provided community residents with an opportunity to experience firsthand the recommended improvements in the Action Plan. Second, it offered an opportunity for the County to evaluate traffic impacts of and public response to one of the plan’s recommendations for a key corridor on the network.

WHAT WE HEARD Infrastructure, Policy, and Program Priorities

Residents expressed their ideas about infrastructure and other priorities during the virtual open house. These community priorities offer insight into the issues and values residents see as most important to walking and biking in St. Louis County. Feedback received regarding infrastructure priorities was consistent with what was heard during Phase 2 engagement. Residents shared their desires to prioritize repair to existing sidewalks, construct more sidewalks, and construct off-road bike facilities. The input received through the virtual open house reaffirmed recommended infrastructure improvements proposed in the draft pedestrian and bicycle networks and helped the project team to refine these recommendations for the final plan.