photo by Elizabeth Festa
This is a quickie. It takes such a short amount of time, I don’t think of it. It is over before you know it, and yet it is something you remember forever (or I do). So, it is something many of us take for granted — walking to school.
The Hill’s neighborhood elementary schools take in-bounds and out-of-bounds students, of course, but many families live close enough in our dense community to walk with their pint-sized charges, or escort them as they bike, scoot, swoop, run or even swing from vines and branches to get there (as my active son seems to to do — his feet are only on the sidewalk proper less than 50% of the time, so not sure if I would classify him as a walk-to-schooler.
Of course, it sure is nice that parents get to tumble out of the door and stretch their pre-arthritic joints the few blocks to the school door and catch up with fellow parents on homework, class dynamics, PTA intrigues, or get-togethers, but it is the kids, some of whom know nothing else, who are truly taking this for granted.
They get to jump, stomp, shuffle, skip, pick flowers for teachers (sorry, A Street NE), run after butterflies, turn over stones, jump off embankments, throw snowballs, slide sticks through the dirt, bang sticks along fences (sorry, 13th Street NE), leap to avoid dog poop (early football obstacle course training), shout to friends, hide in trees and shake wet branches on their sisters, all this instead of be strapped into a carseat before 9 AM listening to WTOP’s traffic report, NPR’s flatly toned instructions for enlightenment, Glenn Beck’s rants, strains of Wheels on the Bus (which you never hear on a bus) or an unholy amalgamation of all of these, punctuated with offhand curses of the safe but tense driver, and honking horns, and idling motors.
“If I had to drive to school,” says one of my favorite Mom pals, “I would miss the conversations that we have. In the mornings, we talk about nature, the kids ask questions, or we talk about what specials they have that day. Same with the way home — who did they sit by at lunch? Who did they play with at recess? We see if the spider that we saw in the morning is still there. Not that you can’t talk in the car, but walking is far better for conversation.” Thanks, H!
Bussing is a good thing, and it has integrated schools, and diversified community schools, and brought those who need education to places of that educate them, so it is a great force in our society, but those that can walk to a school of their choice should really do what all people who take things for granted do. Look puzzled now when told of it, recall it whistfully, years later,when they realize how lucky they were. But, shh! Don’t tell them now. They are looking at a spider.
You got it, sista.
We’ve been walking to school on the Hill for seven years and as one of many families that crosses Pennsylvania Ave with small children, I would love any advice on how to lobby for longer traffic lights. We have 21 seconds to cross a very wide street, with a large island in the middle. My kids are now 5 and 9 and we only make it across if we run. When they were smaller, it took two lights to cross Pennsylvania Ave. We cross at 11th Street, but the length of the lights are the same at 12th, 9th, 8th…all the way up to 3rd Street.
And every morning, I realize that the DC Dept. f Transportation has calibrated these lights to move commuters from Maryland through our neighborhood quickly.
How can we get the DDOT to add 5 seconds to the north/south crossing lights even just in the mornings, so that our kids can safely walk to school – whether they are walking south to the Day School, St. Peters, Brent and Tyler – or those of us walking north to Watkins, Peabody and elsewhere?
Jill,
Couldn’t agree more. We walk routinely to Brent and the light at Penn and North Carolina is the bane of our existence. It’s sad that DDOT times the lights for Maryland commuters rather than DC residents.
As many of you know, I live on the corner of 10th and Constitution and have spent the last 9+ years examining the behaviors of commuters from Maryland. Obviously this is wholly unscientific, but from what I can tell, the lights NOT being synced to move commuters through quickly causes more accidents and reckless driving.
Drivers attempt to make as many lights as possible, and hence drive entirely too fast in the short spurts that they have. The pursuit of this goal leads them to ignore traffic crossing or turning from the numbered streets – and that’s just the cars. No way they’re stopping for pedestrians. Plus, it makes it more difficult for them to stop in a hurry – slamming on brakes and skidding into crosswalks.
I obviously understand the desire to cross the street with your family – but discouraging the swift movement of commuters may have unintended consequences.
And while I’m on the topic… can I implore parents – and all pedestrians – to remember the wise “look both ways before crossing” rule? The number of people – a scary majority with their children – who simply walk across the street without pausing or looking is shocking. Just because a driver has a stop sign, doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t pause at the curb and make sure the car is going to actually stop before mindlessly walking you and your progeny into the street. What if the car’s brakes fail? What if the driver doesn’t see the stop sign? What if the driver is drunk (God forbid)? While it would be nice to live in a world where every car stopped, every time – that’s simply not the reality. And you’re taking your life and the lives of your children for granted by wandering into the street without pausing and looking. Further, do this pausing and looking ON THE SIDEWALK not a foot or six into the street! I get you want to cross the street, but you need to wait in the sidewalk. This means you AND your stroller.
When I walk my dog, I make her sit on the edge of the sidewalk before we cross the street – every street, regardless of if we have the right of way, the street is devoid of cars, or if our light is about to turn. I do this for my safety and hers. Cars are nothing but dangerous, unpredictable machines, helmed by emotional, irrational human animals – treat them as such.
We are lucky to live in such a lovely, walkable neighborhood – but this isn’t some Pleasantville-esque utopia where cars all magically stop and tragedies are always averted in the last second. Please, be careful out there!
I don’t walk to school but I do walk to work and talk about loosing the commuting stress. No traffic, no Metro problems. AHHHH.
Luckily I don’t have to cross too many of the big streets but there is one light situation I hate with a purple passion. The one for drivers who are coming down Independence from the west going east that intersects with Pennsylvania at 3rd. That is a death trap with mostly Maryland drivers who have worked up speed and don’t want to bother to stop for the light. Two times I have missed being hit at a fairly high rate of speed mind you, by mere inches long after the light has turned red for them.
Nichole,
My kids are seasoned pedestrians and do in fact pay a lot of attention to the cars around them. They pay so much attention that they can identify poor judgment by adults with wheels in a heartbeat. This morning, as we waited for the light to cross Pennsylvania, a bicyclist blew through the red light heading east and nearly ran us over as we jumped out of the way (wasting precious seconds of our 21 second crossing window). My eldest was unstoppable in her rage- “How dare he think the traffic laws don’t apply to him! He could have been hit by a car or hit us!”
Expecting Maryland commuters to sit at a red light on Pennsylvania Ave for 5 seconds longer than they do now should not cause a massive traffic jam.
The key is for DDOT to time the crossing lights all the way down Penn – so that the cars and buses can still move through on the green lights but when it’s red, a normal person can cross the street without running.
I treat crossing Penn as crossing two one-way streets. If I get across both in the time allotted – cool. If not, also fine.
If they retime the lights on Penn to add more time in the way you suggest – which I would be fine with (it’s the timing on Constitution, where the lights aren’t synced and a driver can get two blocks at most before having to stop again) – you also have to be prepared to wait longer to get that walk signal.
And, Jill – my further comments weren’t directed at you personally, just mentioning these things as general points.
TWT4G is asking the local powers that be about the traffic and crossing issues, but it is an election season, so please don’t hold your breath (except when you cross.) DDOT’s spokesman thinks the agency has tread this ground before, but is checking up on it. I now bless our school crossing guard at Maury, on Constitution Ave. I guess her job isn’t to be warm and fuzzy….
Nichole,
Not that I disagree with you (I don’t), but as we’re throwing out general public service ads, let me warn the next person that attempts to accelerate in front of me while I walk my kids through a legal crosswalk on 17th and A SE that they will loose a sideview mirror if they do it again.
Thanks for this sweet little article Liz. I’ve been walking my kids to Watkins and before that Peabody for over 10 years now, and it’s precious good times with my kids. My older two walk to Stuart and now high school (via metro) by themselves and it affords them a good amount of independence in early adolescence that really makes a difference. re: the lights, I would posit that if the lights on constitution were timed so that commuters could get farther along, hitting green lights as they go, we would have a situation like the one on 17th st SE where it is like a freeway with green lights almost the whole way. People would just go fast regardless, and I think, even faster instead of at least being forced to stop at every intersection to slow them down. Also, be very careful if you take it upon yourself to take your frustration out on a driver’s car: I had a friend who threw her keys at a driver’s car who was speeding through a crosswalk while she was in it. SHE ended up getting arrested for launching a projectile at a moving vehicle or some such charge and had to spend many thousands of dollars to defend herself of the charge. The driver was not charged in any way.
I was always so envious of the kids who got to walk to school. Leaving the house when it’s still dark out, only to spend the next hour fighting motion sickness while obnoxious people scream and throw things out the bus windows is no fun. On the plus side, it prepared me for the epic commutes I experience here.
DDOT responds to the THIH query: “One of our engineers when out there today – she called me from 11th and Pennsylvania – and she was going to do an assessment and let me know if there’s anything we can do to make the crossing safer for pedestrians. I will let you know when I hear from hear.”
john
my son is 3 and just started going to maury. i LOVE our walks home together. we discuss his day, talk about the leaves getting ready to change, say “hello” to passing people and dogs…we saw a freakishly large grasshopper two days ago that we are still talking about. this feels like a really special time. yay for neighborhood schools!
Anybody remember the good ol’ days (around 2007-8) when the new Tyler parents got the crossing guard moved to their side of the school so their singleton kids could walk safely, holding both parents’ hands? Yeah, the kids coming from the public housing on the other side of Tyler, usually with fewer parental escorts, they were “tougher, more street-savvy,” etc., and probably didn’t need the crossing guard anymore. Ahhh, memories.
I guess we shouldn’t fault the new Tyler parents for not knowing about the “other” kids. After all, the new kids in the quasi-bilingual track, weren’t mixing with the “other” kids anyway. New kids got their own bathroom, their own new classroom furniture, their own lunch time . . .
Sure would be nice if the walk down nostalgia and appreciation lane that pauses to smell flowers (which is wonderful!) also walked down the other side of that street and paused to consider and enact justice.
I’ll definitely be missing those walks next year… Great article Liz!
“Parent”, Whoever you are, you obviously have no idea what you are talking about and your comment is not only smug but totally nonsensical.
“Got the crossing guard moved to their side of the school” — what does that even mean? There always has been a guard at 11th and G and there always will be, check any time. Your comments about kids getting their own bathroom, lunchtime, etc. are just ridiculous.
It is comments like yours — about “other kids” whatever you think you mean by that — that divide people rather than bring them together. If you actually got involved with the school rather than leaving anonymous rants on blogs you would probably know better.
Echoing Nichole’s comments, I live across from Maury. The new stop signs at 12th street have had the unintended consequence of having cars speed up going towards the light at 13th (eastbound) to try and make the light. I cross frequently at the intersection of 12th Place and Constitution, where there is no light or stop sign to help enforce the cross-walk and have had trouble with the traffic not yielding right-of-way, especially in the evenings. It’s a problem with no easy solution.