Trailnet Champion: Erika Enstrom

Meet Erika Enstrom, our first Trailnet Champion of 2020! Erika has been close to the Trailnet community for a long time and recently joined our board.  She’s passionate about improving active transportation in St. Louis for the benefits it provides to the environment and for the physical health of everyone in the region. We’re excited about her community-driven approach to advocating for safer streets for all!

Erika said she believes Trailnet’s Connecting St. Louis Plan will encourage people to more deeply connect to their communities and enable more walking and bicycling in the region. Her passion for safer, more comfortable streets is bolstered by her joy of walking. She prefers exploring the city on foot, she said, because she can easily put her daughter in the stroller and enjoy all the region has to offer.

“One of the biggest barriers to advancing walking and biking in St. Louis is that the city is so spread out and it seems daunting to think that there is the option to walk or bike from where you live to work or to sporting events or other community events,” Erika said. “That’s what makes the Connecting St. Louis plan so great.  It helps bridge the gap between your everyday community and other communities and really demonstrates that biking throughout the city really is possible.”

Erika is ready to push for a paradigm that values the importance, convenience, and benefits of walking and biking. She said that while connecting such a spread-out city is a challenge, another barrier is in changing the mentality of people in our communities.

“People’s immediate thought is to hop into their cars to move from point A to point B,” Erika said. “By adding infrastructure in the communities and making sure that we have advocates in each of those communities to help push the movement, we can help change that mentality.”

When Erika isn’t advocating for better streets for all, she works in public accounting. She spends her spare time running, biking, enjoying good weather, and playing the cello.

“I am super excited about the trajectory that Trailnet is going in and look forward to helping move the organization along in the future,” Erika said.

We’re so happy she’s on our team!