Parents disregarding standards increases traffic

by Daisy Creager|Staff Writer

Parent interference in the student parking lot results in increased traffic, and the blocking of students' parking spaces.

Whether driven by parents or self-driven to school, students recognize the school rule: that parents have to drop their kids off in the front of the school. It is also known that this is a very loose rule, that isn’t strongly enforced.

“For a very long time, probably since about November, I’ve noticed a lot of parents going back there,” sophomore Dacoda Clarke said. “It’s hard to find a parking space because a lot of parents are driving through the parking lot in the morning to drop off their kids, and then in the afternoon, when you try to leave your parking space,  you can’t because parents have formed a car pool line and they can’t move forward or backwards, so you’re stuck in your parking space until the line is gone. I used to be able to get home by 4:10 but now it’s closer to 4:30.”

With close to 2600 students, there is going to be traffic both in the halls and in the parking lot. But would enforcing this rule relieve some of the congestion?

“We have a lot of students, traffic is going to be an issue,” assistant principal Melvin Echard said. “They come up [to the gym] because it’s faster. The line in the front is backed up to TPC in the mornings.”

The assistant principals said they are doing what they can, and are open for suggestions.

“I would suggest that they enforce the rule that the parents use the front car pool line,” Clarke said. “If they do let parents use the student parking lot, they have to loop around the gym instead of cutting through the parking lot.”

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