Being that EM is primarily an educational entity from young children to adults, would it not be prudent to take an interest in students and how they get to school and go home safely?

Most of the time, we think of school buses or being driven to and from.But one may forget or take for granted those that do walk to and from school.

There are federal guidelines for traffic flow in school zones. Many states have increased those regulations, but localities do not abide by them.

They are developed and implemented so that:

1. Drivers have advanced warning of a school zone and what safety behaviors are required of them.
2. To give students and pedestrians notice of what they can do in each school zone and crosswalk to remain safe.

At times, like here in Maricopa, Arizona, the city of Maricopa has failed on both accounts above.

Case in point:

A couple of months ago, I was going sout through a controlled two-way stop school zone three-way crossing. While turning west on the right turn after a stop and a white pickup truck came from the west on the south side and made a U-turn across the school crosswalk in front of me during school, and returned west.

After looking at this intersection and others, many discrepancies were noticed. Many were not in conformance to state law requiring yellow, not white lines, improper lines, degraded lines, and crosswalks so deteriorated that they were not ADA compliant.

Developed a 30-page report with photos on 14 schools in Maricopa that had defective crosswalks and submitted the report to the Public Works Director. Additionally, a report section was added for improving intersection markings on the 347.

Received a response that some of the matters were in the mill, and the document was appreciated, and that it may be a year or so for improvements. Really?

Okay, so they had all summer to do something, and they did not. Many are not compliant with ADA standards; what’s with that? One could say that safety at crosswalks, especially school crosswalks, are not important and only relevant to the back burner.

Many school communities across America presents similar issues. It is a danger to students; it does not give drivers the proper informed notice as it creates a huge liability for a municipality.

Please read the Maricopa report.