Older students at St. Nicholas elementary school in Caledon, Ont. say they’re being asked to take a dangerous walk to class.
Almost every day since classes started last week, dozens of them and their parents have held protests at the intersection of King Street West and Coleraine Drive in Caldeon.
It’s a four-lane stretch in the midst of a road designated as a bypass to the town centre.
“I really don’t feel safe crossing here” Grade 7 student Ashley Pasek said, looking at the crosswalk before her. “There’s been a lot of close calls with cars and trucks.”
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Pasek and her schoolmates would rather be able to take school buses to get to nearby St. Nicholas elementary, like they used to. At that time there were no sidewalks, signals or crossing guards at the intersection.
Today, all of that infrastructure is in place, and there are two crossing guards stationed there at least until December.
That’s why Peel Region’s school bus consortium, Student Transportation of Peel Region (STOPR), has decided to end busing to the school for kids seven and older.
Peel Region deems the intersection safe for pedestrians and drivers.
Officials say it meets provincial standards. Parents strongly disagree, though.
“(Traffic volume) is only going to get bigger, because there’s a Canadian Tire (distribution centre) that’s going to be opening just down the road, which is 1.6 million square feet,” said parent Renata Gorenc. “And those trucks aren’t even here yet.”
Their effort has gained the support of Caledon’s Town Council, unsuccessfully echoing their call to overturn the busing decision in a recommendation to STOPR.
“STOPR refused to do that,” says Annette Groves, a Caledon Town Councillor and Peel Regional Councillor.
“STOPR refused to listen to anything the Council had to say, and basically called our motion a ‘politically-driven motion.'”
Local Catholic school trustee Frank Di Cosola says his efforts have also been blocked twice.
“The Board of Trustees felt that it was not within my authority as a Trustee to redirect STOPR,” he said.
Parents say that in the past, the bus consortium has bowed to similar arguments from Peel’s other municipalities, Brampton and Mississauga.
The difference is that they have traffic safety councils to do studies and make recommendations, while Caledon does not.
Asked if that’s what it would take for STOPR to address the concerns being voiced in Caledon, spokesperson Bruce Campbell tells Global News, “I’d imagine that that would be a logical piece … There would certainly be a reassessment.”
Caledon does plan to establish a traffic safety council by the end of the year, but it will take some time for it to address this issue.
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