As of recently, students, teachers, and residents alike have been in distress regarding the intersection combining Genito Road and Kelly Green Drive. There have been many car accidents in the intersection while drivers are turning into Clover Hill High School and coming out of it.
Many attractions connect to the intersection, and they draw large crowds and traffic at the same time. These attractions include the new Starbucks, Chipotle, Soccer Posts, and many more that are yet to come.
The other problem is that when school ends at 3:00, everyone is trying to leave the school in a rush. When people are distracted and focused on only getting themselves to the next place they need to be safely, they can inevitably harm themselves and other people if they are not paying close attention.
Health and PE teacher, Ann Harris Collyer, is also a behind-the-wheel instructor at Clover Hill High School. Collyer expresses her thoughts on the students who are at risk because they do not know their right of way.
“That’s why the 10th-grade [driver’s education] teachers right now are teaching the intersections, four-way stops, and roundabouts and how to move along through them correctly because if not, there will be accidents as there have been in previous times,” Coller said.
Once when she was getting off Kelly Green Lane, Collyer said she almost got hit by a car while trying to make a right turn. Another driver was coming towards her in the left lane, and another was making a U-turn, but Collyer did not see that they were trying to make a U-turn, and she pulled into the right lane. Not realizing that the car was actually making a U-turn, it almost hit her.
Collyer listed a good example of why you should always look at your surroundings: even if you do have the right of way, you may never know what people are going to do.
School counseling coordinator, Trip Lawson, says the easiest and safest way out of the school to risk getting into trouble in the intersection is to go out the roundabout. In addition, he expresses the need for patience so that everyone can leave safely.
Mistakes will be made, but they can also be prevented. If you are going through the intersection, make sure you are cautious and make sure you are looking at everyone on the road and trying to think what they are going to do.
Until the pending traffic light is put in, everyone has to work together to make it safe because speeding or impatience is not going to make a situation any better. Furthermore, making sure to know the right-of-way rules is important to make driving around the Hill a safer environment for everyone.
