5th Ave Academy Opening: Decatur PD Traffic Study Shows Oakview Traffic is “Very Limited”
Decatur Metro | April 12, 2011Some residents have expressed continued concerns about traffic in South Decatur with the opening of the new 5th Avenue Academy this fall. As part of the City Schools of Decatur traffic study – which will be presented to the School Board this evening – Decatur PD collected traffic flow data on along Oakview Road on two days in February. The conclusion:
The data indicates that traffic flow on Oakview is very limited. In the mornings the average traffic was less than one car per minute in either direction. In the afternoons the average was slightly more than two cars per minute.
Here are DPD’s hour-by-hour charts for your convenience. “WB” stands for westbound, while “EB” stands for – you guessed it! – eastbound. I’m guessing the colored-in hours are times when school traffic would be highest.
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File this under the category of “no kidding.”
I have always said that 5th Avenue was more walkable for more kids than Glennwood is currently. When you include kids that take the bus, I would bet no more than 1/3rd of the 5th Avenue kids will get to school by private car on a regular basis.
Isn’t a good chunk of Oakview currently blocked to traffic? Right around the construction site?
No, it’s back to being open. And I don’t think it was closed until a good bit after the days the counts were taken.
When my current first grader gets to 5th Avenue, I’m hoping we can carpool from Winnona Park to cut down on the traffic. Winnona Park has a good walking school bus to Glennwood but it is a solid 20-minute walk. I’m guessing that walking to 5th Avenue from Winnona Park would be 30 minutes or more. So I’m not sure that 5th Avenue is more walkable than Glennwood but neither is ideally located for everyone in the city. 5th Avenue is located right at the edge of the city limits while Glennwood is slightly closer to the city center. The high school and Renfroe are the most walkable. But I would not be inclined to let a 4th grader walk to 5th Avenue, especially if they would have to cross the train tracks coming from the north side. Plus, there’s not a great place to cross the tracks for those who would be coming from the northwest side of the city. But hopefully, Oakhurst residents will take advantage of the location and enjoy walking to school, just like we’ve been doing with Glennwood.
I have a couple of basic questions. How does the 4-5 school break down in terms of kids from north versus kids from south of the tracks? Does anyone have any sense of the average traffic outflows from that school – back home to Decatur, to work at Emory, to work at downtown, to destinations to the east?
Depending on the answers to those questions, the traffic analysis may have focused on the wrong place. If the majority of kids are on the north side, then the choke points crossing the tracks are likely to experience heavier volumes. Given the heavy traffic and UNBELIEVABLY slow lights crossing the tracks at McDonough, you would expect the traffic to focus on the underpass at Columbia and the Atlanta Avenue crossings. How will the extra traffic coming across those points clog things? How will the extra traffic find their way to the Oakview autobaun? If they come down South Candler or South McDonough, those could become backed up badly. I wish we had better analysis of the impact on those points.
Then, you need to look at dispersal from the school. Folks going downtown will have a good set of options, whether its Memorial, Hosea Williams or dodging back to DeKalb Avenue. To the extent that folks aren’t headed downtown, they will be doubling back through already clogged roads in Decatur. Fighting your way back to Emory or CDC will load East Lake Drive and the roads leading that way as they’ve not been traveled before. Heading to Tucker or just back to Decatur will put cars in numbers on small neighborhood roads.
Who knows what will happen, but looking at Oakview alone seems to me to be a way to miss the real pinch points.
Well, hold onto your hat, ’cause those statistics are about to change!
The Transportation Plan’s Safe Routes to School Map left off a few of the Intersection Hotspots.
Adair, which is the recommended safe walking route to school for most of the northwest and north central parts of Decatur has no Hot Spots on CSD map. The intersections of Adair/Howard, Adair/ Ponce and Ponce/ Trinity ( remember those pesky private school kids) and Nelson Ferry/ Ponce are not considered Hot Spots. Of course these same narrow roads will serve our cars as well. Same thing goes for all of the corridors along the north east side of town.
Discounting the train track intersection Hot spots, there are 12 Intersection Hot spots shown on the south side of town and 3 Intersection Hot spots shown on the north side of town. Based on this map it appears that our north side kids are on their own. Either get on the bus, hitch a ride or good luck kids.
Agree totally. I don’t see any utility in the traffic study they commissioned. They should look at volumes at the E. Lake/Oakview intersection. Since that’s a 4-way stop, it’ll be impacted in all directions by an additional load of traffic from just a single direction. 150+ additional cars coming through there in a 15 minute window will back things up a bit, I imagine.
A couple other suggestions for study – Davis and Dougherty streets. Most of the eastern half of town will use these to get to Oakview. Agnes Scott is as big a choke point as the railroad for some.
At the Glennwood PTO meeting last night, Bruce Roaden clearly stated that he doesn’t want his students driven to school. He is working with the Safe Routes to School folks on creating recommended routes for each neighborhood and has committed to walking each if them.
On a personal note, I have been allowing my oldest son to bike from Oakhurst, very near College Heights, across the tracks alone to Glennwood since the beginning of 4th grade. This has been an amazing experience for him and has reinforced his independence and responsibility. There are tons of kids riding daily and crossing guards at every dicey crossing. I strongly encourage you to consider it.
I think allowing, even encouraging age-appropriate independence in our children is not only our greatest gift, but our duty as parents.
Squeaky is right – navigating the RR crossing on bikes is a challenge but the kids figure it out quickly, and you can see real joy on their faces with this extra freedom and adventure. Also, the crossing guards at the RR tracks are on top of things and the Decatur Police are ever present.
Just wait until the kids discover the hills on Jefferson and Ansley – a nice long downhill coast most of the way to Oakview.
Squeaky and South Side X: you are my heroes!
1st child: I carried him in my arms across the tracks every time until he was 21.
2nd child: I held his hand as he crossed the tracks until he was 18, and then I just watched him closely.
3rd child: I rolled over in bed and threw her the keys to the car and told her to be back before midnight and not to hit anyone or anything too hard while driving.
Kids are fine. Parents, ok, I, am the one who needs independence.