New West residents trekked across Canada and back in April – without leaving town.
The WALK30 Challenge is a community-based, friendly competition designed to promote healthy, active living by helping people to establish a daily walking routine. Each year, residents in New West and Burnaby are encouraged to walk for at least 30 minutes daily for 30 days during the month of April – and track their steps on a mobile app to see which community walks the most.
“We hope that more and more people join us,” said Pablo Zacarías, executive director of Better Environmentally Sound Transportation. “We had the biggest turnout of all time this year.”
At a May 10 gathering in Tipperary Park, Better Environmentally Sound Transport (BEST) announced the winners of this year’s WALK30 Challenge.
The Golden Shoephy – a trophy awarded to the municipality that logs the most walking minutes per capita – will return to Mayor Patrick Johnstone’s office at New Westminster City Hall, as New Westminster residents outwalked Burnaby residents for the third year in a row.
“Burnaby is much bigger than us, but we are way walkier than they are,” Johnstone told students attending Friday’s celebration. “And it’s because of folks like you.”
Johnstone said hundreds of people in New Westminster took part in this year’s challenge – walking 14,452 kilometres.
“That’s all the way to the other side of Canada and back,” he said.
Noting New Westminster’s hills, Johnstone said local participants walked a combined elevation of 130,000 metres.
“That’s like climbing Mount Everest 15 times,” he said. “These are big numbers.”
Zacarías said TransLink and Vancouver Coastal Health also competed against each other this year. He thanked Fraser Health, Vancouver Coastal Health, TransLink, New Westminster Schools, and the cities of New Westminster and Burnaby for supporting this year’s campaign.
In the elementary school competition, Brentwood Park Elementary was tops in Burnaby and École Qayqayt Elementary School was Number 1 in New West.
Teacher Jessica Dechamplain attended Friday’s celebration with students in her Grade 4/5 French Immersion class at École Qayqayt Elementary School. In addition to logging walking done at school, her students also logged minutes walked outside of school hours.
“They did so much. … It was great,” she said. “They did a good job.”
According to BEST, 565 active participants recorded a total of 483,336 walking minutes in this year’s challenge.
“The results of pre-survey and post-survey indicate that the Walk30 Challenge was an effective campaign to advertise walkability,” said a statement from BEST. “Many survey respondents reported that they were walking more during the WALK30 Challenge than they did before the challenge started.”
Mary Wilson, a member of the Walkers Caucus and one of the co-founders of the WALK30 Challenge, attended Friday’s celebration.
“We support this particular project, WALK30, and we have been doing so for years since it first started. And why do we do it? Because walking is good,” she said. “Walking is good for you. Walking is good for the planet. …. Walking is a legitimate and necessary way of getting around the city. I want you to remember that.”
Wilson encouraged students to keep walking – and to advocate on behalf of pedestrians.
Johnstone echoed Wilson’s advice to let their civic leaders know about steps that can be taken to improve the city’s walkability.
“And keep walking,” he said.
