School's terrible traffic
[attach]4944[/attach]The children at Allenby Junior Public School know to look both ways before crossing the street. Now, parents and residents will both have to look before they park on it.
On June 22, North York Community Council approved several parking amendments to the streets in and around the elementary school in order to combat high levels of traffic and congestion that occur immediately before and after classes.
“It’s fairly busy after school,” said Meredith Baker who lives directly across the street and also has a child at the school. “There’s a lot of children crossing the street and it is quite a lot of traffic.”
The city approved the deletion of permit parking on sections of St. Clements and Castlefield avenues from 12:01 a.m. to 9:30 a.m. It then approved the installation of permit parking in those areas from 12:01 a.m. to 8:30 a.m. Essentially, this allows parents to park in those sections before school without a permit.
For the past seven years, the city, in consultation with residents, parents and the school’s staff, has tried to resolve the traffic problems in various ways. However, some of the previous solutions produced unintended consequences, only increasing tension in the community, according to a community council report.
“There were some requests for turning (St. Clements and Castlefield avenues) into one way streets,” said Toronto District School Board trustee Howard Goodman. “That would remove the congestion but it would also mess up a whole lot of other traffic planning.”
Allenby’s school newsletter has asked parents to treat the avenues as one-way streets, according to parent Karen Andrews, though she says that parents largely ignore the school’s recommendation to travel westbound only on Castlefield and eastbound on St. Clements.
Other suggestions, some of which have been tried over the years, include restricting turns at certain intersections, timing traffic lights or installing new ones and hiring crossing guards. Ward 16 councillor Karen Stintz said she is hopeful the latest parking amendments will help ease congestion.
“We’ve tried lots of things and we’re still working on a solution so we’re hoping this will help,” Stintz said.
“We’re hoping now that people can legally find places to park they won’t park in areas where they weren’t supposed to,” said Stintz.
As a resident, Baker said she is happy with the change because it means visitors can now come to her house earlier. As a parent though, she said the new rules are having no effect on traffic.
Not only is there still a high level of traffic, but she says cars often travel at high speeds. That particular stretch of St. Clements Avenue has speed bumps and a posted speed limit of 30 km/h.
“There’s bumps on our road to slow down traffic but some people go flying over them anyway,” Baker said. “We’ve had our car hit out on the street.”
Signage is not going to make the thoroughfare safer for children, said Baker. For her, enforcement is the answer.
“Maybe people would pay more attention if they saw an actual police officer now and then,” she said.
