Pedestrian and Bicycle Safety Enhancement
The Regional Center of Somerset County is a highly desirable location to live, work, play, visit, and learn. One of the main reasons the Regional Center has become such a magnet for Somerset County is the opportunity to live and work within walking distance of schools, government services, mass transit, parks and recreational facilities, downtown and Main Street districts, community events, and arts and culture. One of the goals of the Regional Center Strategic Plan is to help make the Regional Center a safer place for pedestrians and bicyclists. Pedestrian and bicycle safety is a high priority in New Jersey. The State has taken a number of steps towards improving pedestrian and bicycle safety across the state.
One way the Regional Center Partnership is helping address this issue is supporting designated pedestrian safety enhancement improvements intended to help reduce pedestrian and bicycle accidents in the Regional Center. In 2017 the Regional Center Partnership committed funding to be made available through its challenge grant program specifically to support projects or initiatives in Bridgewater, Raritan and Somerville designed to enhance pedestrian and bicycle safety.
Since this was the first of its kind in the history of RCP’s Challenge Grant program, the Pedestrian Safety Enhancement Challenge Grant initiative was considered to be a pilot project. Bridgewater upgraded the pedestrian signal heads along Commons Way, Raritan partnered with RideWise, Inc. by conducting a “Street Smart” campaign to educate and enforce pedestrian safety laws, and Somerville installed highvisibility pedestrian crossing signage at designated locations around the high school and middle school. The projects were so successfully implemented that the following year RCP allocated another round of funding to support implementation of additional pedestrian-safety enhancing measures. Additional details about these projects can be found on our Challenge Grants page.