Claire Petersky wrote:
My daughter walks or rides her scooter or bike to her elementary school
every day. Because the route goes on a footpath, it's only a quarter mile;
the route by motor vehicle is four times longer. The biggest problem right
now the kids walking is all the other parents who drive. She only has one
street to cross, and of course there's crossing guards, but the parents
still do not seem to respect the pedestrians in the vicinity.

Someone alerted me to this website: http://drivetoschoolhallofshame.com/
that has photographs from a different school, of all the chaos caused by
parents who are driving their kids to school. What is this craziness? WIWAK,
the only time you got a ride from school was when you were sick or
something.


I went to the URL you posted, and just one nit: not all states have a
yield to pedestrian rule. In PA (at least when I lived there years ago)
pedestrians must yield to traffic. Where I live now we do have a yield
to pedestrian rule. When I first moved here, it took me a long while to
get used to that. :-)

But this is my pet peeve too. Three years ago, we lived within walking
distance of the grade school, except that the girls would've had to
cross a very busy major thoroughfare first - and there were no crossing
guards or lights. In the AM this thoroughfare has heavy, swift traffic.
It wasn't safe. So I would drive them. But it amazed me how many
parents who lived on the other side of this major street would drive
their kids to school, even though once you got across the major road,
there were crossing guards (parent volunteers) at every single
intersection, and copious sidewalks. We also have safe zones and all
that.

However, I have been apalled enough on numerous occasions witnessing
parents whipping by over the speed limit in their rush to get the kids
to school, then back on the road to head to the office.

This year both girls are finally walking to school. It's only about 1/2
mile. There is a crossing guard at the light at the busiest point on
the route. However, they have to go out of their way to get to this
light - it is much quicker if they don't, and attempt to cross farther
up the street. I have urged them over and over not to cut at that
point, because despite a crosswalk it is at a bend in the road where
traffic proceeds very fast as people head up to the turnpike. This is
not just parents - it's everyone rushing to commute to work.

The only other thing I wanted to point out is that backpacks have
become very heavy these days. I am amazed at how heavy. Yes, my kids
are walking, but DDs are already complaining that their back hurts by
the time they get to school.

I do wonder how many parents opt for driving simply because they take
pity on kids carrying such huge backpacks. And no, don't say the answer
is a backpack on wheels; we can't have them at MS because they make the
class-changes impossible - take up too much space in the halls.

jen