Fears over safety of pupils

Press, 21 November 1987, Page 9

Fears over safety of pupils

Parents and school committee officials of the Windsor Primary School say the proposed eastern expressway that will cut through Burwood Road and Travis Road will create a daily traffic danger for more than 80

children at the school. Mr Hugh Brown, the school principal, said about a quarter of the school’s roll would twice daily face the hazard of negotiating planned traffic islands at the Burwood-

Travis roads intersection. He and a school committee spokesman, Mr Bruce McLachlan, said there had been insufficient consideration of the children’s needs by local authorities in the design of the intersection.

Mr McLachlan said parents might have to supervise the daily expressway crossing by the 87 children who travelled to the school from south of Travis Road.

Mr Brown also said the expressway which effectively- formed a barrier between the housing expansion south of Travis Road and Windsor School, could affect the future school roll, as this area was where likely roll growth would be found.

But the Waimairi District Council, which is forming the expressway, has defended its proposed roundabout and pedestrian islands at the intersection. The council’s traffic engineer, Mr Peter Atkinson, said the council was doing the best it

could to ensure pedestrian safety. He said the expressway concept was aimed at satisfying several traffic objectives in the area, and that pedestrian islands had been planned to ensure pedestrians had to encounter only one traffic stream at a time.

The issue was part of a broader series of proposals, partly designed to remove the volume of through traffic from the nearby Lakewood Drive.

Mr Atkinson said that the District Council recognised it could not entirely satisfy the wishes of all groups.

Windsor Primary School has circularised parents on forming a roster of adults to accompany children to the school.