If you want a traffic light set up, someone has got to be run over. This is according to the Johannesburg Roads Agency (JRA).
Fairways Primary School, situated on the corner of Corlett Drive and Irene Road, was told this when it applied for a robot to be installed outside the school.
Traffic travelling to and from Sandton passes past the school – a problem for the children who have to get across the street to the playground via a pedestrian crossing that has no stop streets and no traffic lights.
HORRIBLE ACCIDENT NEEDED
During an e-mail correspondence between the JRA and the school, a Fairways Primary representative was told that the only “solution” to the school’s problem was for a horrible accident to occur at the corner.
The school has been battling the roads agency to put up a traffic light.
Before her retirement in the middle of last year, former councillor Ray Wolder had been in communication with the JRA’s William Mabotja on behalf of the school.
In an e-mail exchange in May last year, Mabotja wrote: “The cost to install a robot is (plus minus) R300 000. The robot that was installed on Corlett cnr Jacob (a few roads up from the school) was due to an old woman being hit by a car. This will be your solution.”
The e-mail shocked the school’s governing body, parents and teachers.
School principal Tracy Rae has said that in the four years she has been at the helm, various parents’ organisations have requested a traffic light from the JRA.
TWO ACCIDENTS REPORTED
In January, two accidents were reported outside the school. No children were hurt.
Collette Saitowitz, a safety and security representative for the school’s governing body, said she had sent countless e-mails to the JRA about the situation since Wolder’s e-mails last year. These had all been ignored.
A petition by the community close to the school and the majority of the parents was sent to the JRA in November, but the school has not had a response.
Cars, taxis and trucks speed along the road at all hours of the day.
Despite repeated attempts to get comment from the JRA, spokesman Thulani Makhubela stopped answering phone calls early yesterday afternoon.