Policy and Environmental Supports for Physical Activity

University of South Carolina: Prevention Research Center

Topics:
Community Health | Nutrition & Physical Activity for Adults | Nutrition & Physical Activity for Youth | Obesity & Overweight

Center staff encouraged residents of Sumter County, South Carolina, to form a community coalition and helped the coalition set goals and objectives for increasing residents’ physical activity. The coalition developed several walking programs and National Trails Day events. The community’s heightened awareness of the need for physical activity but the lack of resources for it led to advocacy that helped increase sidewalk projects, develop additional bike lanes and share-the-road projects, complete local trails, begin worksite walking programs and Adopt-a-Park programs, print and distribute 24,000 maps identifying walking routes, and establish a worksite wellness policy by one of the county’s largest employers. Through surveys and focus groups of adults in Sumter County and a comparison county, the researchers are helping the community coalition evaluate the effect of these environmental and policy changes.

 

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