Carly O’Neill 

Staff Writer

Traffic safety has become more increasingly apparent here at Millersville. More specifically the use of the crosswalks around campus. Recently I had the opportunity to interview Police Chief Peter Anders regarding the safety measures being taken to increase the security of Millersville students.

 

I asked him if there were any safety precautions being taken recently in relation to the crosswalks around campus. Chief Anders responded that University police officers are making sure to enforce the 25 mph speed limit by placing more speed signs along North George Street. He stated they have “cited both students and non-students since the summer who have been travelling at rates more than 40 MPH” along this road, making conditions more dangerous for pedestrians.

 

On October 4, the Student Government Association coordinated the annual safety walk with University Police, Facilities Management Department, HARP, Student Lodging, Inc., Borough officials, and others to scope out what areas on campus deem safer than others.

 

According to Anders they “divided the campus and Student Lodging into four quadrants, walked these areas and identified areas from the student lens that are dimly lit or left students with a feeling the area was not as safe as other areas of campus.”

 

Some solutions suggested after this examination of unsafe areas on campus were as follows: “adding lighting, cutting trees and limbs back to improve lighting, repainting crosswalks and adding or relocating the emergency “blue” phones.”

 

Next we discussed the lighting of the crosswalks spread around campus and whether they should be more distinctly lit.

 

After the annual safety walk some solutions proposed included improving lighting on and around the crosswalks, as mentioned earlier cutting back trees along roadways, redesigning crosswalk markings to be more vibrant in hopes to help aid motorists with identifying crosswalks during the day and evening, and adding more flashing crosswalk beacons around approaching walkways.

 

Additionally I brought up how many patrol officers we have around campus to assist student and drivers with proper crosswalk safety.

 

Currently on North George Street officers have been stationed around major crosswalks to help with traffic and crossing pedestrians during class changeover. According to Chief Anders they “currently have two officers and a sergeant assigned to each of the three shifts, day, evening and night shifts.” They are currently in the process of adding three more additional patrol officers to their station.