This is how corrosive car culture in Newton is. A fully-grown adult stood up at a public meeting this week to argue for a right turn on red across the street from Angier Elementary School, otherwise frustrated drivers might blow through the crosswalk in a distracting rage and kill a child.
It’s time to ban cars around schools during drop-off and pick-up times.
The adult, a close neighbor to the school, invested the better part of a Thursday evening to attend a meeting of the Public Safety & Transportation committee to object to right-turn-on-red restrictions on the turn from Manitoba Rd. to Beacon St., mostly out of concern that eliminating the (default) right turn on red will cause backups in her neighborhood.
Right turns on red are a convenience for drivers. Full stop. (See what I did there?) Right turns on red allow drivers to proceed sooner, on the theory that right turns on red are safe enough. It turns a fully signalized turn into the equivalent of a stop sign. There is no benefit to people on foot, only an increased risk that there will be a motor vehicle/person conflict in the crosswalk.
The neighbor’s argument was that eliminating the right turn on red during school drop-off and pick-up times will so increase backup at the intersection that it will turn drivers into raging sociopaths who put children at risk. The correct policy response, according to the neighbor, is to accommodate the latent sociopathy.
Sadly, the neighbor’s diagnosis is not entirely wrong. The neighbor’s solution, however, is all wrong. If we are at risk of sociopathic people in control of machines capable of killing elementary school children, the answer is to remove the risk. Rather than accommodate potential killers, let’s keep them away from our kids altogether.
Don’t mix large groups of small children with two- to three-ton vehicles operated by people in a hurry.
Happily, the committee, by a unanimous vote, rejected the appeal of time-based restrictions on right turns on red at the intersection and, in fact, removed the restrictions. (Traffic Council had approved no right turn on red during three specific periods, only.) Right turns on red will not be allowed at any time. Karma.
Still, the neighbor’s argument highlights the need to more fully separate motor vehicles and crowds of vulnerable children. (Why do I write “motor vehicles” and not “cars”? A huge proportion of motor-vehicle traffic is now actually light-truck. That fancy SUV you’re driving is really a truck.)
Since I last promoted banning cars around schools during drop-off and pick-up, some thoughtful Newtonians posed some quite reasonable questions. This seems like a good opportunity to answer them.
What about working parents?
There is nothing inherently anti-working parent about a ban on cars within a quarter mile or so of a school. There would no impact, at all, on working parents whose children already take the bus or walk to school. Working parents who, out of necessity, drive their children to school, would no longer drop them within sight of the front door. Instead, they would drop them off at the edge of an incredibly safe, almost entirely motor vehicle-free zone filled with happy children and parents walking and biking on the sidewalks and in the street. (I get teary just thinking about it.)
What if my child needs to be escorted to the front door?
They don’t. I mean it. Don’t @ me.
More specifically, the vast majority of children would be far better off gaining the independence that comes from navigating a little part of their world on their own. Hundreds of elementary-school children around the city walk themselves to school every day. More accurately, those unaccompanied children join a vibrant stream of adults and children on the way to or from school. Your child will be fine self-propelling along in that stream.
If your child is really the exception that needs direct adult supervision all the way to the front step, there are options. Park at the edge of the zone and walk together. If that’s not possible, arrange with one or some of those parents already walking their children to the door to look after yours, too. Whether it’s a formal walking school bus or a more informal arrangement to walk with a classmate whose parent is not so time-constrained, it’s hardly a novel concept.
It is less convenient to have to set up and maintain those arrangements than it is to drive your child to the front door. Acknowledged. We should no longer be willing to put children at risk to reduce your inconvenience.
There are going to be true exceptions. Special needs children. Children who are recovering from injuries that limit their mobility. I would hope that their families would recognize the community benefit of car-free zones and arrange to travel through the zones before or after the car-free period. But, if that’s not possible, those families should get a placard and be able to travel through the zone, with hazards flashing, at no more than 5 MPH.
Staying on the working-parent thread, the car-free zone is between my house and my work, how will I get to work on time when I can’t drive through the zone?
Get up a little earlier. Drive around the zone to a point closest to work. Drop off your child.
What about the weather?
Children are already walking and biking to school through the car-free zones. Every day. In all weather. I live along the busiest route to an elementary school. There is never a day without some children (and parents) on foot. To my knowledge, no one has died of exposure to the elements walking to school.
No, seriously, what about sidewalk snow removal?
Sidewalk snow removal is a problem for a handful of weeks during the school year. If sidewalk snow is really a problem, suspend car-free zones during those weeks. But, sidewalk snow is not a problem.
First, one thing the city is really, really good at: removing snow from streets. If we turn the streets around our schools into car-free zones, children will be able to walk safely in the streets. It won’t matter how well-cleared the sidewalks are or are not.
Second, sidewalk snow removal on the sidewalks within would-be car-free zones is already good and continues to get better.
Third, if good sidewalk snow removal is a pre-requisite of car-free zones, then we should invest in better sidewalk snow removal.
Fourth, if sidewalk snow removal is really an ongoing, unsolvable issue precluding car-free zones, suspend the car-free zones after snows and before sidewalks are clear.
What about the neighbors who live within car-free zones?
What about them? Like everyone else, they are going to need to adjust their lives to restricted access to city streets for a few hours a day. Why is 24/7 unrestricted access a value that’s more important than the health and safety of our children?
What about the neighborhoods at the edge of the car-free zones, aren’t they going to get congested with parents dropping their kids off?
Absolutely. But, if we’re willing to put high up with congestion directly around schools now, why wouldn’t we be willing to put up with less concentrated congestion at points a bit away from schools?
The answer is, of course, political. Currently, my neighbors and I endure heavy traffic by our homes each morning, but the real congestion is closer to the local school. If we did a car-free zone, my neighbors and I would see the backups on our street. We’d only see a part of the backup. It would be spread around several blocks in the area. That’s a bunch of people motivated to complain and object.
We should be ignored.
Okay, I’m sold, how can we get started?
Like any other big change, car-free zones should be implemented in phases. Pick a school that seems particularly well-suited for a car-free zone (a school that’s not on an arterial). Conduct a trial of a car-free zone, in a month that’s unlikely to see much snow, like October. It will, initially, probably require a meaningful manual investment, like putting up and taking down traffic barriers to demarcate the zone. If it works (and it will!), do a longer trial. Do a trial at another school. Do a trial at a school, like Williams or Angier that is along an arterial. Make some zones permanent. Lather. Rinse. Repeat.
It won’t happen overnight.
As far as I know, you need to submit signatures from several neighbors to appeal a traffic council decision. I’m surprised that individual was able to gather enough signatures for such a silly endeavor.
I love this idea. I think we should do everything possible to send the message that Newton is closed to cut-through traffic, and this would be a step in the right direction.
Sean, even when I agree with you, your tone is always so off-putting.
A rant worthy of that other Sean and about at convincing.
Sean – your condescension and lack of empathy are breathtaking. Absolutely, we need to make school zones safer. But belittling those who need (as opposed to want) to drive and naming yourself arbiter of what counts as “need” is not the way to convince people, plus shows an unwillingness to listen to the other side.
Take the issue of people who might live within the “no drive” zones. For just one example, if you use The Ride to get places, you have no control of whether they show up at the proper time (and they have a bad record on that score). If they show up late and are in the “no drive” window, do you have to miss a crucial medical appointment you’ve waited 3 months to get? Or your idea of placards and hazard lights for parents dropping off kids who really do need to be driven door-to-door – that ensures everyone knows the child has a disability, whether or not they would otherwise choose to disclose it (especially when disclosure can lead to bullying – and yes, there are invisible disabilities that can make this necessary). I could give many more examples.
Yes, we need to make walking to school safer. Let’s first look at less draconian measures, and be sympathetic to those whose needs are different from what we think they should be.
I was just rereading this rant and this stood out to me: “First, one thing the city is really, really good at: removing snow from streets.” NOT in my neck of the woods!
Maybe we could start with the middle and high schools, where students should be mature enough to walk a couple blocks on their own. We drove by Oak Hill today when youth baseball/softball teams were coming off the fields. Drivers were insane. There were kids everywhere, crossing in the middle of the road, being dropped off in the middle of the road, etc. and drivers gunning the gas and swerving around stopped cars.
I’m not sure if there is a law about swerving around a stopped car, but there should be. This is how the teens in Needham were run over last year. The first car to hit them stopped, the second car swerved around the first car and ran over a girl.
In situations like Lucia describes, increased enforcement and handing out tickets would be a useful start.
Elmo,
It took me a while (I’m slow). Now that I get it, ouch.
Meredith,
There are plenty of exceptions that would have to be accommodated. This was a blog post, not a full-on feasibility study. In fact, the point of having a trial, as I recommend, would be to flush out the exceptions and determine which are fatal to the idea and which need to be addressed with tweaks to the plan.
The Ride scenario seems to be an easy case: allow access to the zone by Ride vehicles, with the level of caution I describe above. They’d be driving through a pedestrian zone and they should proceed accordingly. This is quite common with other pedestrian-only areas, like Quincy Market or Downtown Crossing. Police, ambulances, and security drive through. Sometimes construction- and maintenance-related vehicles. The success of a car-free zone around schools doesn’t depend on 100% car-freeness. Beyond that, the city would work with the MBTA and other agencies to develop rules that support the objectives of car-free zones, like requiring drivers to wait until there is vehicle access and not abandon passengers.
As for the special-needs example, I feel like this might just be trolling. If the child has a manifest physical disability, the car-free zone doesn’t reveal anything that’s secret. So, your positing a child who can walk a quarter mile, doesn’t take the bus, but somehow has no parent or caregiver or school employee or some adult available to walk them through the school zone? You further posit, that the only thing that would expose the child’s disability is a car-free zone. And, that the downside risk to exposing such a child is to continue to put 12,500 children’s physical safety at risk every single day. If there is such a child and there is such a risk, it would certainly be worthwhile to consider how to accommodate their needs. Seems like rejecting car-free zones is a bit of an extreme reaction.
Maybe, empathy is not demonstrated by one’s ability to conjure exceptions. Maybe, empathy is demonstrated by one’s ability to look at a culture of car-centricity that’s destroying our planet, our city, and our neighborhoods and challenge the status quo on behalf of children now and in the future. I’m not proposing this for me.
If you have other cases that give you concern, please share.
@Sean – I am not trolling; I don’t troll. As I wrote, some disabilities that require a child to be walked to the door are invisible. They aren’t all physical, either. And I didn’t go out of my way to conjure up examples – I know plenty of people who have situations most people wouldn’t think of because of my online work in the disabilities community.
For just one example, a friend’s child has a problem with elopement (running away if no one’s holding his hand) and therefore has to be walked into the school. The friend has a medical disability (not obvious to the casual observer) that keeps them from being able to walk any distance much of the time, so they can’t walk the child through the no-car zone, and the child’s other parent is often out of town on business. No one would know this child’s disability just by looking. Other people I know have children with invisible medical disabilities that don’t require wheelchairs or crutches, but reduce their ability to walk a quarter mile at least some of the time or mean they can’t walk the distance in bad weather. A friend’s child has a cardiac condition that means they often can walk a distance and also can’t be on a school bus ride that takes more than 1/2 hour for safety reasons (and the school system won’t guarantee a route that will avoid that, despite doctor notes).
These are just a few examples of the people I know, most of whom wish they could just stick their kid on the bus or have them walk to school.
Also, I grew up in a city that didn’t require having a car, in a family that didn’t own one. I didn’t get my drivers license until I was 22. I wish I could do without a car now, but my own medical problems mean I have to drive to work though I work from home some days when I can. I did not grow up in the car culture nor do I love it. I just want us to look for solutions that don’t punish people or treat them judgmentally when they have real needs.
OK, I’m gonna be the “In my day….” guy. Is there an epidemic of kids being hit by cars or physically endangered by cars in Newton? Sure, there are bad drivers and impatient ones and I realize that instituting car-free zones would make everyone safer on the way to school. But this seems like a ridiculously overthought concept by someone who hates cars. Seems too nanny-state to me. And yes, I have a child who walks to school (Day Middle) and passes across very busy streets (California and Crafts). Maybe a public relations campaign posting signs in high-traffic areas warning drivers and students alike?
I think we should try a car-free zone tbh. Yep there are lots of what-if issues, and sure things to be worked out with Neighbors, but as with many things the fears of the unknown are much reduced when people experience it and those planning and designing it are able to tweak a final design. is everything solvable? no maybe not and disability access maybe means that instead of a car-free it becomes a temporary dead end with parking/standing enforcement keeping everybody else out…
We simply cannot afford to keep driving kids to school at the rate we do, it is simply nuts!
Car free zone is a stupid idea.
Sean, if people live there, they have a 24/7 easement on the throughfare that is used to access their property. You are being super inconsiderate to people who actually put up with a lot of live near a school.
Plus, thanks to our super awesome lack of planning and zoning, this crazy dumb idea will paralyze several major roads and stifle commercial traffic to some of our village business zones.
So, people should wait at red lights, and they should ticket idling and also speeding, but no more restriction on our freedom to move within our city please.
Where is the data? I have no opinion on this issue right now. I’m reading anecdotal and opinion comments on this thread.
I googled all sorts of variations of students being hit by cars. I went to the CDC. I’m not finding anything that supports your claim nor your opponents claim.
Where is the epidemic? Give us something.
Hi Kim – Pedestrian death rates are a chicken and egg scenario, the more dangerous it feels to walk (increased speed and # of cars) the fewer people walk. That said, according to the Governor’s Highway Safety Association (which tracks state by state) pedestrian death rates are at a 25 year high. Pedestrian deaths increased 27% between 2007 and 2016 (latest data available) and overall traffic deaths decreased by 14%. https://www.ghsa.org/sites/default/files/2018-02/pedestrians18.pdf
@Dave Brigham, the real epidemic is kids getting driven to school. That epidemic hurts individuals — kids are growing up to be less fit and less independent — and it hurts our community with congested traffic patterns that impact everyone, not just families getting their kids to school. Whether or not you accept Sean’s extreme position on car-free zones, and acknowledging Meredith’s points on special needs, I think it’s obvious that the results are overwhelmingly bad when too many people drive. Why then, don’t we have policies to to encourage modal shift? Instead, we’re letting the epidemic continue. Blue zones encourage driving near schools. Parents at my school feel entitled to queue up and stand in a lane of traffic to drop off in the blue zone (Meredith, I’m sure this doesn’t help abutters waiting for their Ride to show up. I can’t imagine what it would mean in a true emergency). Improvements for vehicles is always taken up quickly by school committee or the aldermen, but pedestrian improvements or traffic calming is always controversial. Even in the way we site and design our new schools, it’s always cars first, though awareness of “safe routes” has been slowly improving. If you want to see how bad our infrastructure is, look no further than Newton South where kids walk and bike through parking lot traffic because they didn’t build proper pedestrian facilities to the new school entrance in the 1990’s. It’s embarrassing.
The danger of motor vehicles around schools is both perceived and real (as I’m sure you know, there is breathtakingly bad behavior by motorists at schools and crossings around the city every day) . More cars and congestion inevitably lead to more road rage. That’s also a disincentive for families let their kids walk or ride a bike.
There’s only one logical conclusion: more people drive their kids to school. We need to break that cycle somehow. For more than a decade, I’ve been working on Safe Routes where we give out stickers and do various other events and educational programs, but it only goes so far. I’m open to new ideas.
It’s easy to say lack of enforcement is the problem. The police have shown that they will only show up occasionally at school zones after persistent requests from school staff, and enforcement is rare. Police tactics usually involve verbal warnings, which have no lasting impact. Police officer and parking control staffing and the timing of shift changes make it nearly impossible to provide enforcement even if the appetite was there.
For those of you who can see beyond slinging personal insults at Sean, look at his points on merit. It doesn’t have to be all-or-nothing. Without going to extremes, if families driving to the front door today (not even pulling all the way up in the blue zone because they have to have a direct line of sight to the front door) could choose to occasionally let their kids walk even a short distance, even once a week, it would make a real difference for everyone. I want to believe there is plenty incentive already if everyone could use reason. Dropping your kid off a block or two away at a safe location has to be quicker than queueing in traffic.
@Adam – I agree it’s a problem. I disagree with the solution and really object to the tone/attitude towards all drivers. I haven’t seen personal insults at Sean – certainly nothing like occurs on some other V14 threads.
BTW, one thing no one has addressed here is changing the culture that tells parents that they are negligent if they let their children out of their sight to walk anywhere alone, to the point that some parents have had the police called on them. If we’re going to have children walking to school, we have to stop the scare tactics that say something terrible’s going to happen to kids if we let them walk 2 blocks on their own.
Meredith,
Unfortunately some scare tactics became reality. Several years ago in nyc, boy walking from school abducted several blocks from home and murdered…
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Leiby_Kletzky
Statistically its very low, but some very sick people out there. Wonder if its more cost effective to station a police officer along destinated walking zones during morning/evening in the warmer months
Another vociferous Newton resident who wants to ban the one thing he personally doesn’t need. Perhaps he’s in excellent physical condition, doesn’t mind getting stuck in torrential downpours, doesn’t have to report for work promptly at 8:30 am, and hasn’t endured remarks from other parents who think that letting your 1st grader walk alone is a form of criminal neglect. Most Newton families, workers, and businesses need our roads at rush hour (and pay taxes to maintain and police them).
Too many people in Newton want to ban something popular that’s not personally important to them: cannabis, leaf blowers, drones, styrofoam, drinking straws, plastic bags, even “Snout Houses” (homes with garages in front). We can influence how, and whether, people use these things without banning them.
I see Sean’s post as the latest in a disturbing trend in Newton. I’ll call it the Banner Movement. These “Banners” consider themselves very liberal, but the bans the promote are deeply illiberal. They have no qualms about depriving the community–especially local business–of modern essentials. Each Banner has a different vision of utopia. For Sean, it’s a city without cars. For another, it’s a city without retail cannabis, which, of course, will cause Newton residents to drive elsewhere for cannabis. These personal utopias are incompatible. If the city enacts too many bans without direct democratic consent, we will be stuck with an unduly restrictive society that nobody wanted.
Fear and excuses are at the core of the problem. Torrential downpours happen, but I can tell you that the number of times they happen exactly at school arrival or dismissal is very few, and the kids do survive. Perhaps some shame others who let their young children go “free range” for a few hundred feet. Is that a cultural problem we can all work on or a stand the schools can take, or do we just continue to poke fun at it? Taxpayers need roads that are congested by school traffic and people who live along those roads would like to enjoy some peace. (Yes, the parents are taxpayers, too, but not the only ones using the roads) But we’re hardly making the most efficient use of our collective resources. Our neighborhoods are a mess for an hour or so every day, unnecessarily. Our school zones are becoming increasingly dangerous. Are these problems worth solving?
@Adam – I was not suggesting that the shaming of parents who let their kids walk is a reason not to do it. Quite the opposite – I was trying to say that if we want more kids walking to school or being dropped off a couple of blocks away, we need to actively work to change the culture. Having the schools repeat the message to parents that letting kids walk a couple of blocks is a *good* thing is one way to do it. Making sure the Newton police know that parents shouldn’t be looked into for letting their kids walk a couple of blocks is also important (not saying the NPD currently do that, but parents need to be assured it won’t happen).
@Adam–You make plenty of constructive suggestions. I haven’t seen anybody here disagree with them. But surely you don’t advocate shutting down Parker Street and Walnut Street (in front of our two high schools) during morning rush hour? It’s that kind of extremism that I oppose.
11 years ago a group of Newton parents got together to discuss how we could fix the insanity around our children’s schools. We started the Safe Routes to School Task Force. Sean was one of the parents advocating for us to think big and push back on what has become the norm. This many years later we are still having the same conversations at our SRTS meetings (although I am cautiously optimistic that things could change a great deal in the next few years).
Age old argument: Since not every parent can walk and most parents are super busy, we need to make our schools convenient to drive to.
Keep in mind that the more convenient it is to drive, the more parents that will drive. Planners refer to this as induced demand.
Also not every parent can drive, so we need to make the school zones safe and easy for those arriving by foot, bike and bus. The types of things that make it convenient to arrive by car are usually in direct conflict with design that is walkable/bikeable and works for the bus.
The best thing we can do for busy parents is create schools where kids can safely and easily get there without adults. If you are a rushed elementary school parent, imagine kissing your child goodbye at 8 at your front door. You will get a whole extra 30 minutes and zero stress from having the blue zone craziness. If your child can walk home, imagine the stress that relieves for you. News for any young parent out there, your child schelpping duties don’t necessarily end after elementary school unless you figure out how to get your child walking, biking or taking transit.
As for the congestion impact of creating walkable schools, you need only look at the reduced congestion the day after school gets out to see the impact of school drop off has on our city.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/jul/13/uk-schools-move-to-ban-the-school-run-to-protect-pupils-from-air-pollution
Something else that no one is discussing. Air quality around our schools. Other countries are banning car drop off and pick up for this reason.
We used to have a situation in which many more kids than now walked to school , not because of restrictions but because of positive incentives and convenience. When most kids in Newton Highlands could walk to Hyde, most kids in Lower Falls could walk to Hamilton, kids in Oak Hill Park could walk to Memorial, kids in Upper Falls could walk to Emerson, the problem leading to the suggestion of car free zones did not exist at least in such large proportions.
It’s very difficult to undo decades of foolish and short sighted decisions, but we can make some steps in that direction. The Northland redevelopment of Needham Street should include a requirement of a site and perhaps a building that could allow Upper Falls kids and Highlands kids south of Route 9 to walk to school and encourage Avalon kids and kids from neighborhoods near Needham Street to cross at extremely well controlled intersections (Oak Street for instance
The concept of car-free zones is a product of making schools car dependent.
@brian I beg to differ on the real reason we have more children arriving at school by car. The real reason is as a society we now no longer “trust” kids to get there on their own. So now that parents are in charge of the school commute, most parents are too car centric themselves and drive. Here is some data from Newton.
31% of NPS parents completed a survey in 2014 on how their children get to school and why. This survey estimated that we have well over 10,000 vehicle trips a day associated with kids getting to school. Given the changes in school population since then this is probably higher.
At the elementary school level, the survey indicated that 1/3 of the trips for students that live under 1/2 mile are by car. This is a 10 minute walk at most. 60% of the trips for students who live over a mile (thus could be on the bus) are also by car.
At the middle school level, kids who qualify for the bus are on it. Those who don’t are mostly driven. In fact, 35% of vehicle trips are for students who live under a mile. This is a 15 minute walk or less.
At the high schools, bus usage drops way off. 20% of the car trips are under a mile. Yet many of their classmates are walking and their average walk is a mile.
In the open comments, we heard from some parents that they love the special time they spend with their children driving to school. I am not certain why they can’t have that special time walking to school, at least part way. We also heard from a few parents that the driving to school is so stressful that they have started to walk and love it. And of course, we had a comment or two that mentioned driving as their God given right.
We are a 20 minute walk to our elementary school and we truly love walking. But we can’t always do it because a) I don’t have flexibility at work and when my shift starts at 9, I can’t get home at 8:40 and make my shift on time, b) extracurriculars that start at 3:30 don’t leave time for a walk home (and extracurriculars are at the mercy of my work schedule and finances) c) the majority of our walk is on a busy road with no shoulders and many neighbors neglect to shovel their sidewalks so after a good snowfall it can be a a while before we can walk to school safely.
People who think there’s an easy solution do so out of privilege.
In general the city is much quieter after school ends because so many people with kids leave for a good part of the summer so it is not surprising that the city is less congested then.
I think time factors (theirs and their child’s) in a lot of people’s decision making regarding getting to and from school. Having an elenentary age kid ride the bus for 45 min -1hr as my kids experienced was not always feasible nor did I always feel it was the best use of their time when they didn’t have somewhere else to be. I had them take the bus in since we had the short route to school and the long route home. Middle school is a dream because the bus ride is short both ways so I only drive when I have to (missed bus or somewhere to be soon after-school). My son now wants to bike to hs whenever possible since the bus takes longer and he has to get up earlier to make the bus than to bike. I have heard for afterschool sports that I had better get my carpools organized because the late bus often doesn’t work for the schedule.
For the survey on hs kids was it specified whether it was a kid or parent driving to school? If parent is it because they are trying to give their child more to sleep etc due to the early start time? Maybe that statistic will improve if/when later start times are implemented.
Closing down streets near schools (in addition to Walnut & Parker you would have Beacon near Angier & potentiality near Zervas) is not a workable solution as it is not fair to those who live near schools and it would likely push non school thru traffic down less traveled streets shifting the problem. Keeping as many schools neighborhood schools so that a walk or short bus ride is feasible and encouraging walking are much more realistic. A good solution allows for bikers, walkers and cars to co-exist safety. You lose support by pushing such extreme solutions.
Closing Beacon St in front of Zervas and Angier, closing Dedham St in front of Countryside, Cherry & Derby Streets in front of Franklin, Watertown St and Albemarle Rd in front to Horace-Mann… OK, so we will create a pedestrian utopia within 1/4 mile of the schools and an post-apocalyptic nightmare everywhere else. So the kids can be dropped off 1/4 mile away and still face the same traffic nightmares and hazards, but it won’t be within line of sight of the schools…
Not to mention the traffic that will be forced upon the side streets. Tractor Trailer’s taking down wires on Paulson Rd in Waban. There won’t be parking available in front of Starbucks & BOA in Waban Square because parents are using those spots to park and walk their 5 & 6 year old’s to school instead of dropping at the curb out front. What sort of police resources will be needed to create these DMZs at all 15 elementary schools and the 4 middle schools twice per day?
We live in such a bubble that we forget that the traffic on the roads isn’t just Newton locals. It is people traveling to and through the city for meetings, appointments, interviews, etc. Trucks coming to deliver goods to our local businesses. The harder we make it to do business in Newton the more expensive things become. If transportation costs go up to our local stores & restaurants, that will get passed onto us, the consumer. I know the people in favor of these ideas down play the side effects seeing only the benefit they desire… But a change like this effects tens of thousands of people daily.
What would our streets look like if 100% of the children in Newton were on a bus, walked or biked? Did you ever think about the impact of parent traffic on the buses?
For example: Elm Drive at Newton North is THE drop off for the school buses and many of the vans drop there as well. But many mornings, these buses and vans sit in traffic because some parents CHOOSE to drop off here instead of the many other places they can do so. Several times during the last 6 years, I have observed student arrival with SC or CC and PTSO. I have seen buses sit for more than 10minutes. Parents when asked will mostly admit that sitting in this line of traffic is silly. Some of these people I know. They may have spent longer driving over +waiting than if their child walked. And in addition all of these cars also make it very unsafe for kids walking and biking to school. But fixing it will require changing habits for parents who drive. I think it is completely unfair that the kids who got up early to take the bus, walk or biked are held up or put in unsafe positions by kids being driven.
As for MS and HS sports, my son usually biked to MS and always biked to HS. It saved him time over the kids in carpool because the traffic was so bad coming home from practice. He would get home from practice 15 minutes or more vs friends in our neighborhood.
We all have to work harder to get our kids out of the car. Kids need more exercise. They need time to relax and recharge. Harvard Professor Dr Ratey wrote a whole book about it called SPARK. Walking before school will get kids ready for school.
One last comment about privilege, this goes both ways. People who think that if we can’t make it safe for kids to walk or bike, parents can just drive their kids are privileged. FYI we have people in our community who do not drive their children to school. They can’t drive themselves often because of a disability, they may not be able to afford a car or they leave for work before their kids leave for school. The SRTS survey had 89 such people respond and they had heartbreaking comments that they worry for their children and wish it was safer. We owe it to these kids and all the kids in our community to make it safe.
I am 100% in favor of Sean’s proposal. And I’d actually like to start with Lowell Ave. in Newtonville. Frankly, we should encourage the majority of parents who drive their kids to North to drop their healthy teens off either in Newtonville (or, better yet, on Washington St.) or on Comm Ave. These are roads that are built to handle more traffic and these are students who are relatively healthy. In fact, when they want something, most are quite adept at walking, on their own, to either of these locations. Yes, there are exceptions, we should give those students accommodations.
I’ve spoken to too many parents who drive their kids out of convenience and to avoid the morning whine. I know the feeling, I have succumbed to it myself. But the constant driving teaches an reinforces behavior that we, as a society, need to change.
During my son’s senior year at North a classmate came in late to class, complaining that he had to circle for 35 minutes to find a parking spot. Even during rush hour, getting from one side of Newton to the other normally doesn’t take 35 minutes (and I know that there are exceptions, please don’t flame me with your specific stories), but this student spent 35 minutes in a car just circling the school.
My son laughed. His bike ride took him 15 minutes.
But that student drove because he thought it was perfectly normal to drive to school, that’s the behavior that was reinforced.
My son, on his bike, is seen as the outcast on the road, pushed to the side and marginalized by traffic. I should note that my other son was doored on Lowell Ave. last year when a student, realizing it was faster to walk than to sit in traffic, opened the passenger side door to get out without looking. My son was unhurt, but it shook him a bit.
We need to change our attitude, and we should start with our kids.
I see no harm in doing a trial of a car-free zone around one or more of the schools.
Don’t worry, it won’t be in your neighborhood!
Michael Singer on September 9, 2018 at 5:17 pm
Michael, don’t call me Shirley. South could effectively be closed to traffic by closing one end of Brandeis Road. No way you’d close Parker Street for that, not that it would make much difference. It barely moves in the morning. But that’s not the point. Each school is different in the way its neighborhood is laid out and what the surrounding roads are. I think a car free zone could work at some schools as a periodic event, just for awareness, maybe on a walk to school day.
I have no reason to think Sean does not want us to take his modest proposal literally, but I think there’s great value in just taking it as a thought experiment. Imagine how many problems would be solved and how many ways people could be accommodated by breaking up a single point of congestion to multiple smaller ones further away — parents rushing to their offices at 8:30 could actually save time — and perhaps raising resistance to driving too, especially for those nearby. If Sean’s is too draconian for you, propose something else. I’m tired of people making excuses for the status quo. Every day people take the extreme position that everyone has the right to drive as much as they need to. I have no problem with Sean taking the opposite extreme position.
There are plenty of other ways to prioritize people over cars that are far less extreme. For example, the city could stop bending over backwards to accommodate more school traffic, or shut down blue zones blocking traffic with idling cars, as was done at Angier. The school department could make a policy of giving preference to people walking or taking the bus, or eliminating bus fees or running shuttle buses to village centers for high school or middle schoolers, or breaking taboo and having principals and PTOs actually recommend people try to drive less when they can, instead of pretending they can accommodate everyone. There’s no question some people need to drive, but we need to acknowledge it comes at a cost.
There is a car-free zone – Nevada Street is closed to traffic before and after school between California Street and Linwood Avenue. Only the school bus, special ed vans and resident cars are permitted.