Crowded schools = too much traffic
With schools overcrowded these days, there are often traffic jams outside them morning and afternoon. Statistic here says three quarters of grade school kids are now driven to and fro.
-
Kate
Reply
SANTÉ QUÉBEC COVID NUMBERS
Deaths in Quebec:
20,034
As of May 15
Numbers from Santé Québec
Updated irregularly now
Canada Covid epidemiology update
Recent Posts
Recent Comments
- Blork on Desjardins apologizes for Canadian flag
- Kate on Judge invalidates language clause
- Kate on Amtrak run suspended again
- H. John on Judge invalidates language clause
- BobR on Amtrak run suspended again
- jeather on Espace Aéro, money for flight
- Tee Owe on Amtrak run suspended again
☠️
INCIDENT TOTE BOARD 2024
Island homicides
13
Pedestrians killed
5
Cyclists killed
0
Pages
Other levels of gov’t
Sideblog projects
Enviro Montreal is a Twitter feed that follows environment news.
Archives
Pages rescued from montreal.com
Meta
jeather 10:15 on 2019-02-04 Permalink
There’s a huge gap between “close enough to walk to” and “far enough that you get to take the bus”; I know of kids who are entitled to the bus picked up more than an hour before school starts, and if that’s a choice, you’d probably not choose it; you can’t easily carpool anymore because kids are in booster seats until grade 3. A lot of things act in concert to encourage parents to drive their kids to school individually. I’m not sure if you can take the bus to school in the mornings only, either, for kids who need to stay in the afterschool care.
dwgs 11:05 on 2019-02-04 Permalink
I blame the helicopter parents, a lot of those kids are perfectly capable of walking to school just as generations did before them. I live near LCC and the traffic jam to get there in the morning is ridiculous, cars backed up onto Sherbrooke St. for a half hour every morning. You would think they could at least drop the precious cargo at the corner of Sherbrooke or Monkland and Royal and let them walk the last block or two but no… I personally know at least one kid who is 16 years old and his mother has driven him to school every morning since kindergarten.
Chris 11:34 on 2019-02-04 Permalink
It is all yet another example of the many downsides of car culture. Cars make streets “too dangerous” for kids to walk to school, so they too need to be in cars, and the cycle amplifies. 🙁
dwgs 11:54 on 2019-02-04 Permalink
Cars are no more dangerous now than they ever were. You could make the argument that things like ABS, better handling, mandatory winter tires, backup cameras etc make cars safer now than they were a generation ago.
jeather 13:00 on 2019-02-04 Permalink
Yeah I’m thinking of elementary age only. Once you’re in high school you can take public transit or walk (or, indeed, carpool).
Blork 13:15 on 2019-02-04 Permalink
@dwgs: objectively, and narrowly viewed, you are correct; cars are safer now than they were a generation ago, and dramatically safer than they were two generations ago. However, there are additional factors to consider:
(1) There are many more cars on the road now than there were a generation or two ago. So while individually, cars are safer, collectively there is likely a net loss in overall safety.
(2) Drivers are possibly less safe now than a generation or two ago. The two main factors are mobile phone distraction (texting, phoning, tinkering with the music player, tinkering with the navigation app, etc.) and possibly an overall sense of complacency among many drivers due to a false sense of security from driving safer cars.
Michael Black 16:31 on 2019-02-04 Permalink
Thirty years ago lots of parents would wait for their kids outside Ecole Internationale in Westmount by parking with one set of wheels on the sidewalk. It was common, then made worse because they’d then move by driving with those wheels on the sidewalk.
Those parents were done of the worst drivers I saw, if they didn’t hurt their own kids, they were a danger to the other kids.
So it’s very recursive.
I have no idea if it still happens.
Michael
Jack 20:14 on 2019-02-04 Permalink
One of the things that did my heart good was looking at Ste. Cecile in Villeray last fall. Their had to be a 100 bikes locked on the fences, both sides. Kids rode their bikes to school, why? Because de Castelneau was made a single lane with traffic calming on all four corners.
Parents realized that with that level of car protection along with the critical mass of kids on bikes, they would be safe.
Where else can this be done….everywhere.
Know this, parents will lead this change teachers will not. When my daughter attended the school 15 years ago the teachers tried to take a part of the school yard to expand their parking space. Parents pushed back… hard and those cars were removed and the space went back to the school yard.
Tux 00:40 on 2019-02-08 Permalink
From third grade on I took the STCUM to and from elementary school. It was good prep for commuting.