Your guide to NYC's public proceedings.
Q&A
Council Member Louis questions DOT on school safety and vehicle issues
1:03:08
ยท
3 min
Council Member Farah N. Louis raises concerns about school safety in her district and questions DOT representatives about measures to protect child pedestrians and address issues with school buses and commercial vehicles in retail zones. DOT officials discuss their approach to school safety, including the youth safety action plan, and explain their efforts to manage bus parking and loading zones.
- DOT mentions implementing treatments like road diets, new crosswalks, and hardened daylighting near schools
- The department acknowledges issues with school bus "parkouts" and commits to follow up on specific locations
- DOT discusses efforts to accommodate loading at curbside and expand truck loading zones in retail corridors
Farah N. Louis
1:03:08
Thank you chair and good morning all for being here this morning.
1:03:12
We recently had two separate near tragedies in my district outside of Great Oaks Elementary School and the Cortelyou Elementary Schools where families were endangered navigating to school.
1:03:24
I wanted to know what physical and enforcement measures does DOT consider for school zones to better protect child pedestrians?
1:03:33
What is DOT doing to address the ongoing issue of school buses and large commercial vehicles occupying curb space in rental, in sorry, in retail zones during the day and has DOT considered new regulatory approaches such as restricted hours, permits and requirements or designated loading zones to reduce harmful and disruptive bus and truck parking and commercial corridors which impact both public safety and economic activity.
Eric Beaton
1:04:06
Yes, so speaking first to the question about schools, we take school safety very seriously.
1:04:18
And And it's incredibly tragic when incidents happen or even if they almost happen.
1:04:23
And so we have an extra focus.
1:04:26
We put together a youth safety action plan last year that really looked at what treatments should we be doing.
1:04:33
And to some extent it's similar treatments.
1:04:37
It can be road diets.
1:04:38
It can be new crosswalks or hardened daylighting.
1:04:42
But with an extra focus on areas where a lot of children are present, We also wanted to look at the area more broadly around the school because in some places we found that the most dangerous intersection isn't always the corner where the school is, but it's the surrounding area.
1:04:56
Two blocks away where they have to cross the
Farah N. Louis
1:04:57
base Well, can that measure be implemented by these two schools?
Eric Beaton
1:05:00
Yeah.
1:05:00
We we will look into it.
Farah N. Louis
1:05:02
And then just the additional questions on what is DOT doing to address the ongoing issue of school buses and large commercial vehicles occupying curb space by rent by retail zones?
Joshua Benson
1:05:13
Thank you for the questions, council member.
1:05:15
So the the school bus operations are are mostly contractors working for Department of Education, so we'll be happy to follow-up with them on if there's a specific location.
Farah N. Louis
1:05:29
There's specific locations all around the city.
1:05:31
It's happening everywhere.
1:05:32
Is DOT also working with DOE
Zach Miller
1:05:35
and
UNKNOWN
1:05:35
NYPD to
Zach Miller
1:05:35
We
Joshua Benson
1:05:37
do.
1:05:37
And so they refer to that as parkouts.
1:05:40
So when bus operator has completed their morning run and they're waiting to do the afternoon run, they find somewhere convenient to park, and it's kind of just like killing time.
1:05:54
So we do work with them on that and try to discourage it from locations where it's not appropriate or having a negative safety effect and happy to follow-up on more specific locations.
1:06:08
And then with respect to the loading activity in general, we absolutely try to accommodate loading at the curbside rather than double parking.
1:06:19
So in many retail corridors and certainly throughout Midtown, we have truck loading zones or commercial parking, and we're always looking to expand upon that.
1:06:31
And that's a dynamic situation because stores open, close, and new developments happen, so we're always looking to do better find
Farah N. Louis
1:06:43
places to have some locations.
Joshua Benson
1:06:46
We'd be happy to.
Farah N. Louis
1:06:46
Thank you so much.
1:06:47
You.
1:06:47
Thank