By Denise Rideout
Administrators at Immaculata High School are asking OC Transpo to pick students up on school grounds because they think crossing Main Street to get to a bus stop is too dangerous.
Bernard Swords, principal of Immaculata, says the stretch of road in front of the school is much too busy for students to be crossing.
“Our biggest concern right now at the school is the safety of students who have to cross Main Street,” he says.
Swords says almost half of the school’s 1,300 students catch OC Transpo buses at the end of the day.
Students in Grades 7 and 8 take the yellow school buses, while the remainder of students that require transportation use the OC Transpo bus system. For many of them, that means crossing Main Street to get to a bus stop. The street is especially busy when school ends at 2:40 p.m., says Swords, because there are so many cars coming to the school to pick up students.
Eugene Milito, Immaculata’s vice principal, says at a meeting between OC Transpo and the Ottawa-Carleton Catholic School Board on Jan. 13 he suggested that buses actually drive onto the school’s grounds.
“Students are crossing across the street and there’s a lot of traffic,” Milito says. Students often cross at the intersection of Main Street and Evelyn Avenue where there is a controlled traffic light.
“In a perfect world, the kids would wait until they have a green light (to walk). But that doesn’t happen.”
Milito admits the school has tried to handle the safety issue on its own, and adds that staff often go outside to warn students not to cross the road when cars are coming.
Sylvia Araniva, a Grade 9 student at Immaculata, agrees that students often run across the street. She says she thinks students do it because they’re in a hurry to catch a bus.
“I guess it could be dangerous,” Araniva says. “Some people are just running and some people almost get hit.
“The only time it would probably concern us is if someone got killed.”
Although no students have been seriously hurt when crossing the street, Milito says, there have been some close calls. He says people in the community have called the school to say they almost ran into students who were crossing Main Street.
Now, he thinks OC Transpo can help out by putting a bus stop on school property.
Joel Koffman, manager of bus schedules for OC Transpo, says he doesn’t think the situation is as dangerous as Immaculata claims.
“It’s not unsafe for students to cross at a controlled traffic light,” says Koffman, who attended the school board meeting.
Still, says Koffman, the company will seriously consider the school’s proposal.
OC Transpo buses already go on school grounds at four other schools in the region.
Koffman says those schools either had the facilities in place to accommodate buses coming on their property or they made the required changes.
Koffman says the school is responsible for covering the costs of the renovations.
In the meantime, Immaculata is now starting a study of the layout of its property. Once that is done, Koffman says the company will decide if its buses will make a stop on school grounds.
“If they’re willing to make the changes to satisfy it, then we’ll do it,” Koffman says.