At a time when auto industry woes, climate change, and economic stimulus funding are dominating the headlines out of Washington, D.C., American cities, towns, and counties are racing to advance transportation planning that puts more emphasis on walking, bicycling, and transit use. “Transportation 101: Making Way for Walkers and Bikers,” an educational session set for Monday, Sept. 14, at 9:45 a.m., will highlight the lessons learned by two ICMA-member communities that pursued these goals nearly three decades ago.

Arlington County, Va., and the city of Decatur, Ga., have become models for success in creating communities where residents don’t depend on cars for routine travel. While they have very different stories to tell, ICMA members in both jurisdictions are quick to note that progress came only with long-term planning and strategic investments over time. And both have important lessons to share in Montréal.

County Manager Ron Carlee, will share the story of Arlington’s transformation from a declining, inner-ring suburb of Washington, D.C., when he arrived 30 years ago to one of the region’s most prosperous communities. Carlee credits county leaders for seeing the value of fostering transit-oriented development around Arlington’s subway stations when the Metrorail system was built back in the late 1970s. The neighborhoods along the county’s Rosslyn-Ballston metro corridor have since become some of the most popular in the region, with property values holding steady during a period of sharp declines elsewhere.

Carlee will tell another story as well, about a community he says is “as car-oriented and suburban as anywhere in America.” The Shirlington community in southern Arlington has no Metro station. But the county built its first fully enclosed bus transfer station there in 2008, just blocks from new restaurants, shops, and housing that replaced what had been an aging shopping center. The redevelopment also features new sidewalks and other pedestrian-friendly amenities, and the county recently invested about $4 million to connect a regional trail network in Shirlington, making it a showcase for active transportation.

Another success story comes from the Atlanta metropolitan area, where Decatur, Ga., has made active living the guiding theme of a transportation plan it adopted last year. The plan marks the culmination of an effort that began in the early 1980s, when the city set out to revitalize its downtown. Amanda Thompson, Decatur’s planning director, will describe her city’s focus on incorporating alternative transportation as the basis for an economic revitalization of Decatur’s downtown district, where residents, shoppers, and office employees can rely on their feet and the city’s MARTA subway station to carry out their daily routines. Thompson said she’ll describe how the city funded its transportation improvements and share conceptual drawings of current projects that illustrate “complete streets” in Decatur that serve pedestrians and bicyclists as well as cars.

During the “Transportation 101” conference session, the Arlington and Decatur stories will be placed in the context of a changing environment for transportation funding in Washington, where Congress and the White House are focused on the upcoming reauthorization of multi-billion-dollar federal transportation programs and the issue of climate change. David Goldberg, communications director of Transportation for America, will provide perspective on a political environment that has become much more favorable for investing in transit, pedestrian, and bicycle facilities at a time of growing concern about climate change and the nation’s obesity epidemic. The session was developed with support from Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Leadership for Healthy Communities initiative, which is comprised of ICMA and ten other organizations that serve policy-makers in school districts and at the state and local levels of government.

Local government efforts to address obesity, with all of its associated health risks such as heart disease and diabetes, is the theme of another session on Tuesday, Sept. 15, at 12:30 p.m., “Obesity in Your Community: Why You Should Care and What You Can Do.” The session will spotlight a new set of measures developed by ICMA’s Center for Performance Measurement, which partnered with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to identify policies and environmental change strategies that cities, towns, and counties use to make it easier for residents to get routine activity. The session also will spotlight efforts in Lynchburg, Va., and Albany, Ore., to incorporate healthy community design.