Students from North Delta’s Seaquam Secondary are raising concerns regarding student safety, demanding the City of Delta take action to make crossing the road safer for students.
Students for Safe Crossing recently gathered crossing statistics in the morning before school, and in the afternoon once students were dismissed. They concluded that more than 200 students cross in an undesignated crossing area.
According to the group, many students cross Lyon Road near the Seaquam information display in front of the school before and after school. These students do not use the crosswalk further down Lyon Road, as it is not the most convenient nor accessible route.
The students say the current crosswalk does not lead directly to the school since there is a fence directly in front of the crosswalk.
To ensure students are safe while crossing the road, students are demanding a new crosswalk be created where a majority of students are crossing.
When Students for Safe Crossing reached out to the City of Delta about this issue, they were proposed with alternate solutions, which they say will not resolve the issue.
Delta proposed solutions, which would require students to comply with the current crosswalk.
Students for Safe Crossing says the problem with this suggestion is that instead of illegally crossing on Lyon Road, students would now be illegally crossing on Woodcrest Place. They would also be trespassing on someone’s lawn as there is no sidewalk on one side of the current crosswalk.
“We told them about the need for a new crosswalk since the current one is not convenient, but all they did was dismiss our idea and give us solutions which wouldn’t even work,” said Students for Safe Crossing spokesperson Esha Saini about their discussions with the City of Delta. “We feel as if our group’s concerns have been ignored despite the urgency of our issue.”
Delta’s director of engineering Steven Lan said he applauds the efforts of the students and that the city is taking the issue seriously.
“Our staff did reach out and meet with the students and there was a discussion about how we evaluate requests for pedestrian crosswalks,” said Lan. “From my understanding there was no specifics with regards to location, but we will be meeting with the school principal this Friday. Normally we evaluate these requests through the school and not through the students. Once we meet with the principal we will bring this back to our technical advisory committee for review. That is a normal practice for us and one we follow.”
