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Pedestrians Plead with Motorists, 'Please Stop'!

"All that we want is to cross the road in safety," says Nancy Larson, assistant to the dean of the College and one of about thirty MHC employees who signed a petition calling attention to the danger they face each time they cross Route 116. Motorists regularly ignore a state law to stop whenever a pedestrian is in a crosswalk, petitioners say. Instead, Larson says, many zoom by, sometimes narrowly missing pedestrians. "There have been injuries and accidents, but we're fortunate that no one has been killed," she says, "As crossing the street continued to become more hazardous, people realized that the time had come to do something and began voicing their concerns more publicly."

The employee petition got the issue a hearing at a mid-December meeting of South Hadley's select board, and town officials are investigating several possible ways to reduce the danger. Among them are: asking South Hadley police to increase enforcement of the law; increasing pedestrian visibility by turning on streetlights that were turned off several years ago to save money; changing the existing traffic lights from a green-yellow-red cycle to a blinking-yellow-and-red cycle; eliminating a passing zone near the College; and moving a traffic light to the crosswalk in front of Mary Lyon Hall from its current location just up the hill. Among other possible causes of accidents, according to Linda Young, a South Hadley council member and senior administrative assistant in the biological sciences department, are pedestrians who cross "anywhere they please" (not at crosswalks), "step out into the street without looking for traffic," and "don't cross in groups," thereby prolonging the time motorists have to wait for pedestrians.

The issue was also raised at a December 15 meeting of the Massachusetts Highway Department, which is considering the redesign of the town common and surrounding roads. Dean of administration Wayne Gass told the engineers at that meeting of the College's concerns during an "open mike" portion of the meeting, and intends to follow up with a letter concerning the crosswalks and the passing zone in front of Mary Woolley Hall.

Director of public safety Paul Ominsky said his department recognized this problem years ago, and worked to get the orange and white "pedestrian crossing" barrels that have marked crosswalks in front of Mary Woolley and Mary Lyon Halls for the last two years. He says that although public safety officers have no jurisdiction on state roads like Route 116, he takes the issue very seriously and supports several proposed changes. Acknowledging that the problem lies mainly with drivers, Ominsky also suggests that pedestrians should be extra-careful when crossing streets.

He recommends crossing at the traffic lights, always pressing the "walk" button so the light changes to red. Doing this, rather than waiting at a barrel-marked crosswalk or dashing into a break in traffic during a green light, will help "train drivers on 116 to expect to stop for people," he says.

Ominsky and Larson agree that the real culprit is our "rush-rush society" where, as Larson puts it, "Everyone is in a big hurry to get nowhere." Until drivers reform, Ominsky urges pedestrians to "pay close attention when crossing, because you just never know."