Last Fri­day after our Our One Mile seg­ment on Fox 6, Anchor Rick Jour­ney told me where his “one mile” is. He wanted to be able to walk from his house to a nearby park more safely, and it struck me that if you take a minute to think about it, every­one has some­where they want to go on foot. But, for what­ever rea­son, they can’t.

Think about it: can you safely walk or bike from your home to the near­est gro­cery store, school, park, or shop­ping center? Even if it is a long distance, what are the rea­sons why you’re not walk­ing there? I think that for most of us, it’s the lack of a good route. Is there a side­walk from your house to the near­est gro­cery store?  Or, is there a side­walk, except for one treach­er­ous, sidewalk-free stretch that is just too unsafe to travel?

We really want to hear from you tomor­row (Tues­day) at the Our One Mile Kick­off at 5:30 at the Ala­gasco Cen­ter for Energy Tech­nol­ogy on 20th Street in Birm­ing­ham. Please come and share your One Mile! We want to know where those treach­er­ous areas are that are pre­vent­ing you from walk­ing, bik­ing, strolling, or rolling. Your com­ments, ideas and feed­back will be worked into a green­ways plan for Jef­fer­son County. With your help, we can really cre­ate a more con­nected com­mu­nity for all of us.