Student parking rule should be revisited

Valley Stream Central High School District Board of Education members admit they made a bold move last year when they decided that students would no longer be allowed to leave the campus in their cars for lunch. It drew harsh reaction from students, and so far the results have been mixed.

The change has made quite an impact on local neighborhoods. At North High School, the student parking lot is more than half-empty every day, as students park on the side streets instead so they can still take their cars out for lunch. At Central High, students have been parking on the street all the way up to Memorial Junior High, prompting village officials to ban daytime parking in front of that school at the urging of school district officials.

We don’t question that this policy was instituted for good reasons. School officials wanted to prevent accidents like those that have occurred in other Long Island school districts, where students racing back from lunch have been involved in some horrific crashes.

Since the policy went into effect, there have been more tragedies. Earlier this year, four students from Friends Academy in Locust Valley were involved in a lunchtime accident on Route 107. The driver reportedly ran a stop sign and the car was hit by a dump truck. One of the students eventually died from his injuries.

We never want to see this happen to Valley Stream students. And district officials don’t, either. Unfortunately, students have easily found a way to circumvent the policy, and are still driving to lunch. Now they may have to rush even more because of the extra time they need to walk to and from their cars, which may be parked two or three blocks away from the school instead of in an adjacent lot.

While we agree with the reasoning behind the parking ban, we’re just not sure that it’s effective. Like Board of Education members, we wish students would have given the policy a try. There are places to eat within walking distance of each of the three high schools, and many students do, in fact, walk. And each school has a cafeteria with hot lunches available.

The school district can only enforce the policy when students park on campus. But with a significant number of students choosing not to, the policy has been rendered ineffective. And, it has drawn the ire of neighbors, specifically around North High, with students parking up and down all of the surrounding streets.

Two of the three high schools — North and South — are outside the village, making it harder to add parking restrictions on local streets. And residents near Central High School, where parking is already restricted, can’t be happy that they can’t park in front of their homes during the school day.

The Board of Education should begin a discussion of the effectiveness of the lunch policy. The early results are not encouraging. If the high school district is going to continue to have a liberal open-campus policy, in which students in grades 10 through 12 can leave school during free periods, those students will find a way to drive. Is it safer for them to be in the school parking lot, or on the street?

This is a school district, so why not craft a policy that educates students on how to be responsible drivers. Right now, the only lesson they’re learning is how to get over on the rules. There has to be a solution that can satisfy everyone and still keep students safe. Let’s have some discussion.