As children return to high school this week in L.A., it’s arduous to not take into consideration among the tragedies which have transpired round our colleges — and about how we might forestall the following ones.
In April, just a little earlier than 8 a.m., a pickup truck plowed right into a mom and 6-year-old lady within the crosswalk in entrance of Hancock Park Elementary Faculty within the Mid-Wilshire space, killing the girl and injuring the kid.
The following day, a 14-year-old pupil was hit whereas strolling to Berendo Center Faculty close to Downtown L.A.
In March 2020, 13-year-old Abraham Trejos was ready to cross the road to go to high school in South Los Angeles. When the sunshine turned inexperienced, he began crossing. On the identical time, a 43-year-old lady made a left and hit Abraham; he died on the scene.
As an activist devoted to stopping site visitors violence and different harms from our car-dominated tradition, I do know tragedies like these are each sadly acquainted and utterly preventable.
The Los Angeles Division of Transportation is so chronically understaffed that security enhancements lengthy deliberate for Hancock Park Elementary, together with a curb extension, had been nonetheless not performed regardless of being deliberate for greater than a 12 months. It’s potential these upgrades might have modified the end result that day in April, and lives wouldn’t have been shattered.
As a metropolis, we have to do some soul looking out. How a lot is it value to supply most comfort to drivers if we measure the associated fee in children’ lives? What sorts of compromises are we keen to maintain making to have the “freedom” offered by vehicles? What are we keen to do to verify preventable deaths by no means occur once more?
Within the late Nineteen Eighties, Italy began experimenting with blocking vehicles utterly from streets by colleges throughout faculty hours. In 2012, the UK began doing the identical, and colleges in Paris joined in 2019. The U.Okay. now has greater than 700 such “faculty streets,” France 215, Belgium 170, Spain 150. In america — which is roughly the identical measurement as your entire European Union — we now have a complete of 110.
In Los Angeles, almost all colleges are optimized for folks to drop off and choose up children through vehicles, with automobile valet traces snaking out into adjoining streets and guardian volunteers in vests making an attempt to maintain the road shifting. Our considering has been about enhancing the comfort of shifting youngsters by automobile, versus defending the kids themselves. This metropolis doesn’t have a single car-free avenue in entrance of a faculty.
Automobile crashes are a number one reason for dying of kids in L.A., at a price of 16 deaths per 100,000 children as of 2019. As adults choose to buy bigger and bigger automobiles, this has come at an enormous value to each our youngsters’ security and their freedom. Strolling to high school shouldn’t be lethal.
How can we be certain no little one (or guardian) ever is damage by a driver whereas on their strategy to faculty once more? Whereas the Metropolis Council’s school-specific velocity hump program and decreasing velocity limits round colleges is an efficient begin, it’s not almost sufficient — drivers don’t change habits based mostly on signage, they alter habits based mostly on adjustments to the constructed atmosphere.
We must always instantly put assets towards banning vehicles from the streets the place children enter and exit colleges, a minimum of throughout faculty hours and ideally completely. Sure, which will imply dad and mom who drive their children to high school would want to take extra time as a result of they’ll should drop off farther from faculty or park someplace and stroll their children the remainder of the way in which, however the security advantages are value it.
We must also make each avenue inside a mile of a faculty a “gradual avenue,” with traffic-calming infrastructure inbuilt. This might assist encourage some dad and mom to depart vehicles totally out of their children’ commute, by strolling or biking to high school on what could be safer streets.
Youngsters don’t simply present up at college; they should get there. We must always prioritize strolling and biking methods for them to take action. It could even be nice to see an effort on the state stage to permit transportation funding for colleges to incorporate “bike buses” — adult-led parades of scholars heading to and from faculty by bike. This was just lately handed in Oregon.
There are all the time those that oppose issues like including bike lanes and security enhancements to streets as a result of they don’t wish to hand over house to drive or park. I might ask them this: What sort of metropolis do you wish to create for our kids? Would you like them to have to make use of a automobile to get round on a regular basis? Would you like them inhaling polluted air? Do you wish to reside in a metropolis the place a pedestrian is killed as soon as each three days?
It’s not simply as much as metropolis, county and state officers. Common residents could make an enormous distinction for the higher. The following time a street security mission is proposed, help it, even when it means your commute may take a few minutes longer. Our kids’s lives are value it.
Michael Schneider is the founding father of Streets for All.
