SRTS-funded project celebrated

AMORY — A project designed to enhance the environment, physical fitness and safety was unveiled before a large crowd of local residents and dignitaries in the Town of Amory.

The Safe Routes to Schools (SRTS) program is administered by the Mississippi Department of Transportation (MDOT) to provide funding for programs designed to encourage young students to walk or ride bikes to school. Amory was awarded $660,000 in SRTS funding in 2007, the first and largest allocation to date in the program’s three-year history in Mississippi.

The Amory project will include construction of a new road designated solely for bus traffic at West Amory Elementary School and the installation of sidewalks and lighting along a main route to the campus. The new road, which was dedicated Nov. 20, is named in honor of Lt. Col. Herbert Carter, an Amory resident and a member of the famed Tuskegee Airmen, the first African American pilots to serve in the United States military.