Pre-primary denied humps on road
"It is the municipality's responsibility to make all roads safe for all the people, especially children, since private schools in this instance do not own any roads or part there of"
A REQUEST for speed humps outside a pre-school was shunned by the city’s transport authority, stating that only state-funded schools are considered for traffic calming measures.
After a few odd incidents and numerous near-misses, the principal of Queensburgh Pre-Primary School on Parker’s Hill Road in Northdene, Annette Searle, grew extremely concerned and wrote to the ward councillor, André Mitchell and the eThekwini Municipality’s Road Systems Management Department, hoping to put this to an end. “Our problem does not so much lie with the children being dropped off and collected but rather with people driving past the school without slowing down and often speeding.
“This becomes problematic when children are being collected or dropped off as the parents leaving the school have to back into the road, also there are a lot of children around,” Searle wrote in an e-mail.
The 39-year-old school was initially state-funded but gained independence over the years and is now run by its governing body. In its growth, it has also been able to accommodate double its enrolment from 60 children. “With the school having grown, and obviously people in the area have moved in, the area has gotten bigger, there’s loads of traffic on the road. Traffic congestion outside is horrendous between 7.30am when they are dropping off their children and the times between noon and 12.20pm,” she added. As sound as Searle’s reasons were, the transport authority wrote back and told her that only government schools were acknowledged in this regard.
“In terms of Councils Traffic Calming Policy only government/state-funded schools are being considered for traffic calming purposes. It will be the responsibility of the private/independent institution to undertake the necessary traffic calming measures surrounding the school,” wrote the manager for traffic engineering, Mlamuli Bhengu. Furthermore, all this will be undertaken at the school’s expense, once the request is approved in terms of the council’s specification. However, councillor Mitchell slammed this policy at the departmental operations meeting, stating that it is the municipality’s responsibility to make all roads safe for everybody. “There may be no discrimination against the safety of any children no matter whether the parents are sending them to a private or state school.
“It is through no fault of the innocent child, in fact, it is the municipality’s responsibility to make all roads safe for all the people, especially children, since private schools in this instance do not own any roads or part there of,” the councillor stated. “These private schools were also approved by both the Education Department and our municipality,” he added.
