With many area schools starting back this week, including both the Carter County and Elizabethton School Systems, it is a good time to remind motorists of the need to be extra vigilant when driving, and be on the lookout for students who might not always make the safest decisions and may run into traffic or cause some other traffic-related problem.
Of course, being a safe or defensive driver is always desirable, but this time of year such reminders are especially important.
For the past several weeks, anyone who has been up and on the roads early has enjoyed having area streets and highways almost all to themselves.
If you’re a regular early-morning walker, it’s amazing how quiet the 6:30-7 a.m. hour can be during the summer.
But that changes now.
With the return to school, the streets and highways are a non-stop rush of teachers and administrators driving to work, of parents scrambling to drop off their children at schools, of big yellow school buses stopping and starting as they pick up students waiting alongside the roads.
There will no longer be anything quiet along area roads during the early morning hours.
For almost every weekday, until some other school break, there will be a roar of moving traffic, most of which is fueled by schools.
With the knowledge that there can be traffic delays, school buses loading and unloading, children on bicycles or even perhaps walking to school, the Tennessee Department of Transportation has offered these valuable instructions on how “to put safety first”:
• Pay attention to school zone flashing beacons and obey school zone speed limits.
• Obey school bus laws.
• Stop behind/do not pass a school bus that is stopped to load or unload children.
• If the lights are flashing and the stop arm is extended, opposing traffic must stop unless it is on a divided highway with a grass or concrete median.
• Watch for students gathering near bus stops, and for kids arriving late, who may dart into the street. Children often are unpredictable, and they tend to ignore hazards and take risks.
The start of the school year is the most dangerous time on neighborhood streets and in school zones for child-pedestrians and bus riders. Every day in the United States more than 40 children are hit by cars while walking, according to Safe Kids Worldwide. Unintentional pedestrian injuries are the fifth leading cause of injury-related death in the United States for children ages 5 to 19.
If you’re driving behind a school bus, increase your following distance to allow more time to stop once the lights start to flash. The area 10 feet around a school bus is the most dangerous for children; stop far enough back to give them space to safely enter and exit the bus.
Be patient during drop off and pick up if you drive your child to school or drive near a school. The roadways surrounding schools are often congested during these times.
We suggest parents talk with their children about safe pedestrian practices. Walkers should keep their eyes on the road and focus on their surroundings not on their phones. They should put away their phones and headphones until they reach their destinations.
All good points. We encourage you to take these instructions to heart and to be aware of the dangers that come with the start of a new school year. All our students are precious and we must take every precaution to ensure they are safe, including when they are in a school setting or getting on and off the bus.
It’s a lesson as simple and as powerful as something taught in kindergarten: Watch out for one another.