Walking to school

As some of you know, I've been trying to work with our city and district officials to find a safe way of getting our kids to school. With boundary changes, our kids are going to a new school this year. We live very close to the school (0.6 miles) but the route is a hazardous one. Our kids must walk along a highly traveled road with no sidewalk, along an unfenced open canal. They finally have a crossing guard (which we had to fight for) at the light at the busiest intersection in the city. But to get there, they must cross a very busy entrance to a shopping center which includes a grocery store, video store, pizza place, and a McDonalds (along with several other businesses.) Then the intersection they cross at with the crossing guard is 50 MPH going North/South and 55 MPH going East/West. After crossing the street, they must cross the entrance to a 7-Eleven gas station. We have had SEVERAL near misses at these crossings and I really am holding my breath until they move the crosswalk up the street to avoid these issues. We're now just waiting for flashing school zone signs and then they'll move the crosswalk to the top of our street. (We had to fight for all of this, mind you.)

About 4 weeks ago our local newspaper started covering the story. It ran in yesterday's paper...front page. Here's a link to the story. Click on the picture and you'll see Addie in a turquoise outfit. Both my boys are hidden behind other people but you can see Calder's shorts and legs behind the girl in the blue shirt and you can see part of Gavin behind the crossing guard.

http://www.standard.net/topics/news/2009/09/14/crossing-boulevard

This has been a battle. And we're not finished. It almost seems silly when you see how close we are to the school. But, try walking it with up to 9 kids by yourself. It's seriously an accident waiting to happen!