By Jate Britton
Videographer
Unsafe driving near an Amarillo College crosswalk has sparked concerns among students, faculty and staff. “I was trying to use the crosswalk under the bridge from Parcell’s to the main campus area, and as soon as I started walking, a car came speeding through,” Gillian Crist, a general studies major, said. “An older lady was driving it and she didn’t pay any attention to the crosswalk. I was just a few feet away from being hit. It made me feel like I was at risk of being injured due to others’ lack of care,” she said.
Crist said that she’s noticed several other careless drivers that often fail to yield, leading to frequent endangerment and near-misses with pedestrians, which have caused her to feel unsafe while walking around Washington Street Campus.
According to students, faculty and staff, these incidents commonly occur near the crosswalk between Parcells Hall/Byrd Business Building and the Oscheger Mall, as well as the roundabout near The FirstBank Southwest Center.
Business Administration major, Raina Burusnukul, said parked cars may obstruct drivers’ views. “The crosswalk is kind of a blind spot since there are usually cars parked on the sides of the street under the bridge, blocking people who are about to cross from a driver’s field-of-view,” Burusnukul said. “So, people speeding through don’t realize someone is crossing until it’s too late.”
A few weeks into the second half of the fall semester, FM90 Program Director, Amy Presley, said she came close to being hit while crossing the crosswalk under the 24th Street bridge on her way to the cafe. “I felt very unsafe, the person driving was speeding and it just seemed like they had no regard for human life at all,” Presley said. “They turned out onto Washington Street and spun their tires. They weren’t going to stop for me.”
Presley said that she sees drivers failing to yield and being careless almost everyday. “It’s typically at the crosswalk. The pedestrian is usually doing what’s right, and it’s the driver who isn’t paying attention. I think they’re becoming somewhat more common. And it’s illegal to use your phone while driving anyway, especially in a school zone, and I see people doing that all the time. So you now have a distracted driver in a school zone, so they’re breaking multiple laws at once,” Presley said.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) reports that, at any given moment throughout the day, approximately 660,000 drivers in the United States are distracted by phones or other electronic devices while behind the wheel.
Crist said that she has seen far too many people get hit because of distracted driving. “Both students and drivers alike must be defensive and know the proper yielding etiquette and laws,” Crist said. “It’s understandable that drivers don’t want to wait long at pedestrian crossings, but there are other routes to parking lots with less foot traffic.”
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