The eastern entrance to Miami Senior High from SW 24th avenue is one of the most transited and iconic paths for students to enter and leave school. After all, it’s a rite of passage for the first time at Burger King for hanging out before and after school or visiting the gas station across SW 1st Street for snacks. However, it’s crossing that very SW 1st Street, as well as its left turn to 24th Avenue, that many students notice an issue.
Why are there so many cars?
This has been a problem for as long as many students, parents, and staff can remember. But a certain question has crossed the mind of many: why not just fix it?
The Miami-Dade Planning Department encourages communication about issues and questions like these, saying that it helps identify areas of improvement and places of interest to work on. But when it comes to school related congestion, there isn’t much to work with in terms of solutions.
Schools everywhere have congestion like this, and it’s mainly caused due to students and parents stopping their cars in places not dedicated to them (a result of lack of space or lack of convenience) and failing to keep traffic moving.
However, building more paths or parking is also out of the picture. The Miami-Dade Planning Department directly cited Miami’s great growth as a leading factor for this conclusion. Unfortunately, Miami as a whole has already been built up. With so many urban areas, it can prove difficult to make major changes.
In the case of Miami High, it’s surrounded by houses and businesses that simply can’t be disrupted. And despite what many think, the government cannot do or construct whatever they want; regulations, protocols, and procedures must be followed.
Out of all the schools in the county, Miami Senior High is probably the school hit the hardest by this inevitable issue. Being the oldest in the county, Miami Senior High wasn’t expected to grow to this scale when nearby areas were planned and zoned out. Because of these low-density residential areas that were planned, and changes to school systems that weren’t expected by planners in the mid-late 20th century, buses must stick to 25th Avenue, cutting down on another possible place of exit (at least until the buses leave).
There is the added drawback that Miami High is simply a large school, with it being the high school to attend in a 2–3 mile radius. However, when a new school is planned out, bus areas, student parking, teacher parking, nearby areas, and student attendance are all considered to determine the scale of the project.
Another approach that Miami Senior High Principal Valdes brought up was staggering dismissal times for different classes (freshman, junior, sophomore, and senior) to exit at different times. It seems logical because it is deployed in different elementary and middle schools.
But for those hoping for a traffic fix, the Miami-Dade Planning Department affirmed that there are two main reasons why it can’t be enacted: the first being a logistical issue.
There are many students who take a school-issued bus as their main mode of transportation. With a staggered departure time, these buses that would initially take all students at once would be forced to either wait 15-20 minutes (considering a staggered time of 5 minutes) or must keep driving back and forth between stops and the school. Neither of these cases are favorable and cannot be scaled up, keeping in mind that this is a problem present everywhere.
The second reason would arise not from transportation, but from teachers. A staggered time would force teachers to stay the extra minutes (up to 15-20 considering the 5-minute scenario too). But altering teacher schedules to account for this doesn’t come easy either. Unions like the United Teachers of Dade make collective contracts and agreements explicitly stating terms that can’t be changed, made this way to ensure teacher pay and fair working hours. Rearranging times and schedules for all teachers in the county would be out of the question.
Mr. Valdes also believed that the problem is not major and just has to be put up with in day-to-day life. Mr. Valdes stated that parents will always be parents with the need to quickly pick up their kids on their own terms. This will never change. However, Mr. Valdes pointed out that in the event of an accident or emergency, the school resource officer can step in to help manage the situation and keep things flowing.
This mentality of putting up with the traffic and working around it is not just exclusive to Mr. Valdes. Chess teacher Mr. Jose Bello stated that most teachers just opt to avoid the jam completely. On his daily commute, he comes in early at around 6:30 AM to steer clear of the rush at 7, and waits 20 minutes, 30 minutes, even an hour sometimes to not get caught up in the afternoon chaos. Mr. Bello also credited the cause to the parents: “It’s the parents you can’t control.”
So far, parents have been unanimously credited with being the main cause of school-related traffic. However, some students beg to differ. 11th grade student Jose Gutierrez commented on the many students not crossing at designated areas.
Another junior Joshua Villeda-Romero stated that the the traffic is possibly “annoying for parents”, but reported that he often sees many students cross the street not using the crosswalk.
Whichever way it’s twisted, it starts to seem like less an example of government inaction, but more of a case in which those misinformed or uninformed make assumptions and spread misinformed opinions. It also seems like the lack of cohesion, both between parents and students, can cause the clutter.
In an ideal world, everyone is as efficient as possible, but this is just not the case in the real world. As the years go on, this principle will prove itself time and time again, not just in Miami High, but schools in general.
