Kids from the Beltline have been leading the way towards a safer, greener way to access one of their schools.

Grade 4 students from Connaught School worked with Sustainable Calgary to design a temporary woonerf that would make the Beltline more walkable and bikeable. They also worked with landscape architecture student Lucia Blanco to turn the students’ ideas into a workable plan that could be given to the city.

The project, which is under construction now, is part of Sustainable Calgary’s Stepping Towards a Greener Future Program. The organization is also working on projects in the communities of Martindale and Meridian.

“The idea is to work with kids as designers to create safe and active routes to school,” said Celia Lee, executive director for Sustainable Calgary.

“This particular project we envision will be in for five months, and then from there between us, the community, and the city, we can decide if this something we like and we want to keep,” she said.

The project has been funded by the federal government out of the Climate Awareness Fund.

“The idea is to ask ourselves how can we decrease our carbon footprint—we know that most kids around the world are experiencing a lot of climate anxiety—so it’s really important for them to know that solutions are possible and that they can be part of them.”