For those who have their license, the ability to drive to school in the morning is a great and handy privilege. Though driving to school is supposed to be simple, the traffic it has created is becoming more and more of a problem every year.
Students who park in the school’s front lot get stuck in traffic nearly every morning. The worst part is that the later a student is to school, the more traffic is built up. For all the students that end up walking through Door 1, waiting in line to swipe, it’s likely not their fault they’re late—it’s probably the person who was on their phone in front of them that caused the problem.
Last year, people resorted to cutting through the East View Elementary parking lot as a small shortcut to missing all the traffic in the morning. For many, it worked, but eventually everybody was told that they were not supposed to use the parking lot as a shortcut. In my opinion, people cutting through East View would have been the smartest option students came up with if it didn’t affect how long it took everybody else to get into school from the turn lane. If people are not supposed to cross from East View to OHS, then OHS should get a traffic director out in the front, or have somebody out there to control the light manually.
Another problem with the traffic in the morning, is how many people end up arriving late. For everybody coming in late and swiping in the morning, seconds after the bell rings, the administration should really work something out other than just giving the student a tardy. A parking lot upgrade would be nice, but if the school cannot do that, at least give the students coming in right after the bell a chance. For those late students coming in right after the bell in the morning, a good solution would be to give each student three passes. With these passes, if they are within five minutes of the bell in the morning, they are not considered tardy.
Another big problem I see is how people who don’t care about being late hold up the people that do care. A prime example of this is when you’re in the turning lane at 7:19 and the light turns green, and the person in front of you cares more about what’s on their phone rather than what’s going on in front of them. Then, when they finally do go, they go very slow, because they have to finish sending that last Snapchat before putting the phone down. You can tell these people don’t care because it’s the same people every day. Eventually, when they do park, they walk up to the school very slowly, and typically walk very slowly in the hallways too in order to miss as much of first period as possible.
I hope that someday, the front lot will get a double turning lane and a better layout, but until then, people should at least learn to stay off their phones when they are driving, and be aware of others who are trying to get to school on time.
