{"id":20853,"date":"2014-03-08T13:51:55","date_gmt":"2014-03-08T18:51:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/news\/?p=20853"},"modified":"2014-07-08T13:53:09","modified_gmt":"2014-07-08T17:53:09","slug":"bike-advocate-by-accident","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/news\/2014\/bike-advocate-by-accident\/","title":{"rendered":"Bike advocate, by accident"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>When she woke up on May 1, 2008,<strong> Denise Martin \u201908<\/strong> was one of the many cyclists who \u201cjust kind of rode\u201d without giving much thought to the complicated politics of bicycle advocacy. Things changed later that day when, as she just kind of rode through Harrisonburg, Martin\u2019s wheel was yanked sideways by a skewed railroad crossing on South Main Street. It sent her immediately to the pavement, and soon thereafter, to the emergency room to get patched up.<\/p>\n<p>After finding out that dozens \u2013 by a very conservative estimate \u2013 of other bikers had also come to grief at that skewed crossing, plus another one across town, she was propelled into action.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI felt a bit of responsibility. I didn\u2019t want anyone else to get hurt there,\u201d says Martin, who began badgering the city and the railroad to make the crossings safer for bikers.<\/p>\n<p>Improving the crossings had long been on local bikers\u2019 wish-list, and Martin\u2019s persistence nudged the city and the railroad (entities that take a while to get around to things) into final motion. Within months, new, paved paths were built to allow bikers to negotiate the train tracks at a much safer angle.<\/p>\n<p>That quick return, in terms of tangible improvement, on her first advocacy effort turned Martin into a believer. Now a member of the Rockingham County Bicycle Advisory Committee, she is playing a large advising role in the development of the county\u2019s first-ever plan to incorporate safer bicycle and pedestrian features in local road construction and improvement projects.<\/p>\n<p>Working to make her community a better, safer and more enjoyable place to walk or ride a bicycle ties into Martin\u2019s job as a cardiothoracic care nurse at Rockingham Memorial Hospital (she earned her BSN through EMU\u2019s Adult Degree Completion Program).<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI see everybody on the backside of chronic disease, and see the toll it\u2019s taken on their bodies,\u201d she says. \u201cIf we can make some positive improvements in our community in terms of health and wellness, some of these things can be prevented.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAdvocacy is about getting people to think about the kind of place they want to live,\u201d Martin continues. \u201cI think a lot about our kids, and what kind of community we want to build.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><strong>\u2014 Andrew Jenner \u201904<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>When she woke up on May 1, 2008, Denise Martin \u201908 was one of the many cyclists who \u201cjust kind of rode\u201d without giving much thought to the complicated politics <a href=\"https:\/\/emu.edu\/now\/news\/2014\/bike-advocate-by-accident\/\" target=\"_self\" class=\"more-link\">... read more <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">about Bike advocate, by accident<\/span><\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":148,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5643,5600,4513,5708],"tags":[15824],"feature":[],"class_list":["post-20853","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-environmental-sustainability","category-nursing","category-student-life","category-sustainability","tag-denise-martin"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.6 - 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