Safety tips

If you do drive your child to school, follow these drop-off and pickup safety tips:

1. Don’t make your kids cross the street in a dangerous way just because it’s more convenient for you.

2. Drop children off on the school side of the street.

3. Never double-park and do not let your child out of a vehicle that is not next to the curb.

4. Reduce your speed when you enter a school zone and when children are walking or biking along the road.

5. Train your child to look all ways (left, right, behind and ahead) and then to walk cautiously when crossing the street.

Source: AAA

Davis parent Emily Ault nearly suffered a parent’s worst nightmare one day last week while dropping off her daughter at school: A driver, barreling down Birch Lane, almost hit her 8-year-old daughter Clara in the middle of the crosswalk in front of the school.

The driver was able to slam on the brakes in time, and Clara escaped unscathed, but as Ault told the woman who nearly hit her daughter, “You almost ruined your life and mine in one fell swoop.”

It’s a scene that more and more parents have complained about in recent years: Unsafe driving during drop-off and pickup hours at schools in town.

And despite a steady push to get more kids biking and walking to school — and thus reduce the number of cars traveling to and from Davis campuses — educational preferences may, in fact, be leading to an increase in the number of children being driven to school, city officials say. And the more drivers on the road, they say, the more dangerous it is for kids.

As reported during a recent school board meeting, Davis has an unusually low percentage of children attending their neighborhood schools — schools that, more often than not, are close enough to bike or walk to. Increasingly, children are attending special programs like Spanish Immersion, Montessori and GATE, which often mean traveling clear across town every day.

“One trend we’re seeing, that we’re not surprised about, is that along with the shift away from neighborhood schools is a shift away from walking and biking,” said Davis Street Smarts coordinator Rachel Hartsough. “Because many people have to go farther to school, you’re seeing an increase in driving.”

And with so many cars converging at schools, “there have already been some accidents this year,” Hartsough said. “It’s really important that parents practice and model safe behavior.”

That’s where Street Smarts comes in.

The program conducted a survey in the spring to determine how students are traveling to school, the routes they’re taking and what obstacles may keep them from biking or walking. Some 500 people completed the survey, Hartsough said, and folks from UC Davis, the city and the Davis Police Department are still looking at the data.

They expect to end up with specific information on how many kids are biking to each school, how they’re getting there and what intersections or areas parents are most concerned about.

Additional counts will be done during the course of the school year, from an actual count of bicycles in each school’s bike racks to a count by all teachers, who will ask students for several days in a row how each of them got to school.

“The rationale is to get a solid baseline,” Hartsough said.

The data are required as part of the grant that funds Street Smarts, but the bottom line remains an ongoing effort to get kids out of cars and cars off the road, making the streets safer for everyone.

“It’s about physical fitness, the impact on our climate and also safety,” Hartsough noted.

Kicking things off on Wednesday, Oct. 5, is International “Hike It, Bike It, I Like It” day, during which students all over the world are encouraged to bike or walk to school. Two schools in Davis — Birch Lane and North Davis — have organized events around the day.

“We are trying to encourage no cars on that day,” said Birch Lane parent and biking coordinator Sanne Fettinger, who adds that prizes will be given on a lottery bases to kids who bike or walk.

Meanwhile, Hartsough is gearing up for the annual Safe Streets poster contest. This year, all artwork submitted by students will be displayed at the Davis Art Center during a 10-day exhibit, Dec. 9-19.

Look for fliers to come home with elementary school students the first week of October. As in previous years, children will be placed in two categories: grades K-3 and 4-6, with first-, second- and third-place winners in each category, as well as runners-up.

New this year, artwork from the posters will be incorporated into Safe Streets media from brochures to posters to the large signs seen in bus shelters around town.

For more information on Street Smarts activities, visit http://www.cityofdavis.org/StreetSmarts.

— Reach Anne Ternus-Bellamy at [email protected] or (530) 747-8051.

If you do drive your child to school, follow these drop-off and pickup safety tips:

1. Don’t make your kids cross the street in a dangerous way just because it’s more convenient for you.

2. Drop children off on the school side of the street.

3. Never double-park and do not let your child out of a vehicle that is not next to the curb.

4. Reduce your speed when you enter a school zone and when children are walking or biking along the road.

5. Train your child to look all ways (left, right, behind and ahead) and then to walk cautiously when crossing the street.

Source: AAA

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