by Adallyn Dirilten & Emma Eurich, Reporter, WVTV
AURORA – Commuting to and from Waubonsie Valley has always been a challenge for students and parents alike. Staff members tirelessly work together to try and make the morning traffic run more efficiently, but some factors have hindered this process.
“The morning commute, one of the biggest issues we have is where we’re located, said Waubonsie Valley dean Bob Dobbertin. “We have a state highway and then we have everybody from Plainfield coming north that has to come right past our school. So we have two huge roads with a ton of traffic every day, whether we’re in school or not. That’s our number one challenge, the number of vehicles that are out on the road on a daily basis, and then we have 470 some student parking spaces. Plus, we get between 300 and 500 parents dropping off every day, so just the sheer volume of traffic creates an issue.”
One of the staff’s challenges of managing the flow of traffic is keeping the school’s priorities straight. “Number one is student safety. How do we keep students safe, their families safe as they go through this experience of getting to school. Our Dean’s assistants are out in their bright yellow coats, so that people can see them. Plus, we have rules that the bus company needs us to do because the buses and the students on those buses have different rules to follow than everybody else.”
The big question on many commuters’ minds is if the staff has a plan to make the current traffic situation better. “We’re constantly trying to tweak what we can tweak, to help that flow out. We are limited with certain things about just how the school is set up, where we’re located. Some of the solutions we’ve done is working with the city to extend the light time, so that we can get people in and out. In the last three years, we’ve revamped how our buses come in the morning, and how they line up in the afternoon. Every year we’re always reevaluating how we do things. The best thing is we just need everybody to understand what we’re working with and to work together.”