LOVELL, Wyoming (STPNS) -- A very small but interested crowd showed up at the Lovell Elementary School cafeteria Monday night on a chilly evening to present ideas on how to increase safety for students traveling to school in Lovell.

The meeting, part of the planning process for the federal Safe Routes to Schools program funded by a planning grant from the Wyoming Business Council, was attended by only nine persons: John Eisen and Jan O?Brien of JGA Architects, Engineers and Planners in Billings, Frank Page of HKM Engeering, Chief of Police Nick Lewis, Lovell Town Administrator Bart Grant, Town Councilmen Brian Dickson and Scott Allred, Rhonda Savage of the Lovell Recreation District and a Lovell Chronicle reporter.



No other parents or district patrons were present for the meeting, which was not advertised in last week?s Lovell Chronicle, nor was the newspaper staff made aware of the meeting in time to write a pre-meeting story for last week?s newspaper. Fliers were sent home with school students, however.

The purpose of the meeting was to follow up on a survey presented earlier to the families of elementary school students and see if there were any other issues for the planning process to address before the submission of a grant application this spring.

Eisen said the Safe Routes to School program has both a safety component and a health component. The program is first and foremost driven by safety ? finding ways to get students safely to school ? but it is also designed to identify ways to get kids ?out of the car? and ride a bicycle or walk to school.

?Kids do better if they have some exercise and fresh air on their way to school and come to school wide awake,? Eisen said, noting that there are reasons why some parents drive their children to school, including safety concerns.

O?Brien of the JGA firm talked to parents to find out what some of the issues are in regard to school transportation, Eisen said, basically asking, ?If we get rid of this, this and this,? will parents let their children walk or ride bikes to school?

JGA received 211 returned surveys designed to identify the issues leading toward the submission of a grant application for a comprehensive local Safe Routes to Schools program that is more than just ?signs and stripes,? as Eisen put it, but also includes education, parking, student and family awareness, law enforcement, and other issues.

Possible items to address, Eisen said, include more aggressive law enforcement of speed zones and crosswalks, improved crosswalks, a crossing guard program, having secure bike racks and more.

?It?s pretty much and open book,? Eisen said. ?We?re here tonight to pin down and get insight into what the problems are.?

The basic plan will be presented to the Lovell Town Council in February and another community meeting held before the Safe Routes to Schools grant application is submitted, Eisen said.

Survey results

O?Brien said he was pleasantly surprised by the number of surveys returned, which he said indicates that people are very concerned about safety as it relates to students going to and coming from school.

More than half of the children identified in the surveys live within a half mile of school, and between one-fourth and one-third of the students always walk to school. Travel time averaged five to 10 minutes, O?Brien said.

More than half of students who do not walk to school asked their parents if they could walk, O?Brien said, but 39 of the respondents said they were not comfortable allowing their children to walk or ride their bikes to school at any time. Many said distance ? living more than two miles from the school ? was a major issue, especially in poor weather. Other concerns cited in the surveys included:

? 74 said time was a factor;

? 89 said speeding was a concern;

? 88 said the amount of traffic was a concern;

? 45 were concerned about a lack of sidewalks;

? 84 cited safety at intersections and crosswalks;

? 30 cited a lack of crossing guards;

? 46 cited violence (bullying) as a concern.

In about half of the surveys, on average, respondents said they would be likely to allow their children to walk or ride a bike to school if the issues they cited were addressed.

Community issues

Eisen and O?Brien then led the group through a series of display boards identifying the primary issues at the elementary and middle schools, as well as general issues concerning student safety.

Primary issues identified at Lovell Elementary School included congestion during unloading, poor visibility due to diagonal parking, speeding on Shoshone Avenue and no crossing guard program.

Issues identified at Lovell Middle School included unloading zone congestion, congestion at Jersey and Ninth and no crossing guards.

General issues identified include unsafe crossing at Main and Shoshone, no sidewalks on the Shoshone Avenue hill, traffic enforcement and no guardrails where the Globe Canal crosses under Shoshone Avenue.

A major issue in town, all attending Monday?s meeting agreed, is that drivers say they cannot see whether a child is crossing at the Main and Shoshone crosswalk when a vehicle is stopped in an adjacent lane. If the vehicle is preparing to turn, a child using the crosswalk may be hidden by the vehicle, unable to be seen by an approaching car in the adjacent lane.

Lewis said some 12 to 15 students use the crosswalk at Shoshone and Main each morning and called it ?the scariest intersection to me.?

The need for a crossing guard program was noted, and it was pointed out that there was once a volunteer program in place organized by the now-defunct Lovell Rotary Club. Page said he believes Cody employs paid crossing guards, and Eisen said he believes the PTA raises money to pay for crossing guards in Billings.

As for speed issues, Savage said having stop signs on north-south streets would help, and Lewis said he would like to see the speed limit on Jersey Avenue leading to the middle school reduced.

?30 (mph) on Jersey is too fast,? Lewis said. ?On Shoshone it?s OK, and on Main Street it?s OK, but on Jersey it?s too fast.?

But he said the town cannot unilaterally reduce the speed limits without a study and permission from the Wyoming Dept. of Transportation.

As for congestion and visibility on Shoshone Avenue in front of the elementary school, Lewis said one idea would be to encourage school staff members to use the gravel parking lot just south of the school grounds, which would open up the street and provide more visibility. Savage suggested a yellow no-parking zone along the entire school frontage, and Lewis said even parallel parking would provide more visibility.

Lewis also said many parents drop their students off on the opposite side of the street both to the east of the elementary school on Shoshone and to the west of the school on Kansas, forcing them to cross a street to get to the school rather than dropping them off curbside next to the school.

Lewis also said a crossing guard is needed for the busy Kansas and Washakie intersection.

Addressing the Shoshone Avenue hill issue, Allred said most students walk on the west side of the street as they head up the hill, and he said a motorist cannot see anything below as he or she crests the hill. He said a sidewalk on the west side would be a good idea.

As for speed, Lewis said the Lovell Police Dept. will continue to watch school zones, and he said he would like to obtain a speed trailer ? a device that tells approaching drivers how fast they are going. The device can also record and thus study how fast drivers are going during a particular period of time.

Some improvements are already under way. Lewis said high-visibility signs will be installed soon to indicate crosswalks to motorists.

Eisen took many notes as the citizens spoke and will use the information to form a plan and a grant application.

?We?ll sort it all out and get things more clearly defined,? he said. ?We?ll put together some scenarios, some packages of improvements, and go through them with the town council and get their feel for them. We?ll fine tune and tighten up the recommendations and also have a community meeting.?

Grant and the council members present tentatively set a work meeting to review the JGA recommendations for Monday, Feb. 18, at 7 p.m.