The document summarizes a mural project led by the Bike Federation to engage students and make an intersection safer for biking and walking. Students from a local school identified issues like speeding cars and poor sidewalk conditions that prevented biking and walking. The Bike Federation partnered with artists to develop a mural design with the students incorporating West African symbols representing themes of strength and community. Students learned painting skills and created stencils to paint the mural, which features symbols of interdependence and helping one another. The goal is to beautify the neighborhood and slow traffic to make it safer for biking and walking.

1. INTERSECTION
REPAIRPAINTING POSITIVE
NEIGHBORHOODS
INTERSECTION
REPAIR

2. Story by Jake Newborn
Photos by Dave Schlabowske
The Bike Fed Safe Routes to School team and
our partners from Artists Working in Education
put the final touches on the Hopkins-Lloyd
intersction mural project after the kids finished
most of the work.

3. E
ach year, the Wisconsin
Bike Fed teaches safe
bicycling and walking to
more than 2,500 students at
30 Milwaukee Public School
sites, through our Safe Routes
to School Bicycle Driver’s
Education and Walking
Wisdom classes.
OUR BICYCLE DRIVER’S ED TEAM brings bikes,
helmets, and trained staff to students in grades
four through six, and we take youths in grades
one to three on walks. Every step of the way, we
discuss safety, and the environmental and health
benefits of being active.
These summer camps also guide kids on rides
through their neighborhoods. The Bike Fed shows
them how to travel by bike and discover some of
the fantastic features of our city: the parks, bike
shops, farmer’s markets and Bradford Beach. For
some, it’s their first look at Lake Michigan.
In recent years, we expanded our effort to make
the neighborhoods where students go to school
safer and more accessible for bicycling and walk-
ing.Amuralprojectat15thandHadleyinMilwau-
kee’s 53206 zip code is the most recent and visible

4. This page: In the days leading up to the painting,
students were guided by the artists from Artists
Working in Education to develop a meaningful
design and create the stencils for the different ele-
mentsofthemural.Beforepaintingcouldbegin,they
kids laid out the stencils according to the design and
traced them with chalk, marking where the different
colorswouldbepainted.Thenitwaslikeagiantpaint
bynumbersprojectaseveryonehelpedfillinthecol-
ors with brushes and cans of paint.
“If the sidewalk wasn’t
bumpy, or full of glass,
then I’d walk. If cars
didn’t speed, I’d bike. I
love biking and walking.
I want to do it more.”
ALANDA JACKSON
example. Students from the Hopkins Lloyd Com-
munity Learning Center sparked this project by
noting the lack of well-marked crosswalks, speed-
ing cars and drivers not yielding to pedestrians,
as required by law. They also observed motorists
pass on the right and the generally poor condition
of streets and sidewalks.
The kids identified these as obstacles
that dissuade them and their neigh-
bors from biking or walking.
In response, the Bike Fed part-
nered with Artists Working In
Education to develop an intersec-
tion mural that had cultural relevance, made
a neighborhood more attractive and improved
safety.
Intersection murals are increasingly popular
across the United States and encourage people in
cars to slow down.

5. Two artists, Ammar Nsoroma and Angela Liv-
ermore, taught kids how to make large stencils
and guided them to choose West African Adinkra
symbols with important messages: toughness,
indestructibility, and the principle of looking to
the past to build for the future. The final symbol
painted into the mural means “help me and let
me help you,” and conveys the idea of interdepen-
dence among community members. This symbol
honors the moving parts and organizations that
came together and created this cultural asset.
The mural is a fantastic way to engage the
youths who took the Bike Driver’s Ed course at
the Hopkins Lloyd CLC. Neighbors helped out
and people who walked and bicycled by while
we painted thanked us for doing something pos-
itive in the community. Best of all, the students
took pride in using what they learned in our Safe
Routes to School Summer Bike Camp to make a
lasting improvement in their neighborhood.
In the end, intangible rewards like these are
why we do what we do at the Wisconsin Bike Fed.
We believe that by making our communities, a
better place to ride a bike, we also make it a better
and safer place to live, play, visit, work and run a
business. Hopefully this mural will be a reminder
of our goal to work together to make a better Mil-
waukee — one step, or pedal turn at a time.
Above: Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett congratulates the kids for their great work on the
intersectionmural.Notonlydidkidsgettocreatealastingpaintingtohelpbeautifyandslow
traffic in their neighborhood, but they got experience working together, learned about Afri-
can culture, got helmets, bikes and getting interviewed by the news media (images right).