It’s a good time to review back-to-school safety

As we enter the fall season, our roads are once again at full driving capacity. With school underway, the addition of buses picking up and dropping off students, kids on bikes hurrying to school, and harried parents dropping their children off before work or picking them up after school adds to that congestion. With that in mind, I thought it would be a good time to review some back-to-school traffic safety tips. Most of them aren’t new, but they can serve as a reminder to drivers, bicyclists and pedestrians as they navigate our busy roads.

School zone driving safety tips

• Always keep to the speed limit in a school zone.
• Watch out for school crossing guards, and obey their signals.
• Slow down, and follow all traffic laws when entering a school zone.
• Always stop for school buses that are loading or unloading children.
• Never pass other vehicles while driving in a school zone.

Riding your bike to school

• Keep your phone in your pocket, silenced, while riding
• Always wear a bike helmet.
• Obey the rules of the road. They are the same for all vehicles, including bicycles.
• Stay on the right side of the road and ride in the same direction as traffic.
• If possible, ride with someone else. There’s safety in numbers.
• Never ride a bike while wearing headphones, talking on a cellphone or texting.

Walking to and from school

• Keep your phone in your book bag, silenced.
• Leave early enough to arrive at school at least 10 minutes early.
• Always use available sidewalks and streets.
  n Walk with other students. There’s strength in numbers.
• Cross streets only at designated crosswalks
• Always look both ways before crossing.
• Never cross streets between obstacles (parked cars, bushes, etc.).
• Go straight home after school. Don’t go anywhere else without parental permission.
• Don’t talk to strangers, and never get into a stranger’s vehicle.
• Parents, teach your children to recognize and obey traffic signals and signage.

School bus safety tips for motorists

• If you are approaching a school bus from either the front or behind, and its yellow lights are flashing, the bus is preparing to stop.
• When a bus’s red lights are flashing, you must stop. It’s the law. This includes buses that are on the opposite sides of divided highways, on multiple-lane roadways, in parking lots and on school grounds.

School bus safety tips for students

• Remember to look carefully in both directions — left, right and left again — when crossing a street.
• Wait for the bus at a designated bus stop, and stand well back from the curb.
• Make eye contact with the driver and wait for the driver to signal you before crossing in front of the bus.
• When getting off the bus, look to the rear of the bus before stepping off the bottom step.

To reinforce the important of traffic safety, recent data released by the state Department of Transportation shows that Long Island’s roads have become more dangerous and deadly. Last year alone, there were over 84,000 vehicle crashes on Long Island roads, an increase of 4 percent over 2022.

Those crashes resulted in 216 deaths and more than 26,000 injuries, including 1,400 serious or life-threatening ones. In Nassau County, 66 people died in crashes, and in Suffolk County, which is larger geographically and has more roads, there were 150 deaths.

DOT data for the first five months of 2024 showed nearly 23,000 collisions, with 51 deaths and 356 people seriously injured. There were 379 reported pedestrian collisions and 185 collisions involving bicyclists from January to June.

Those are downright scary statistics, and will hopefully give all of us pause, and motivate us to make a concerted effort to keep traffic safety top of mind throughout the school year ahead and beyond as we carry forward with our busy lives.

John Giuffré represents Nassau County’s 8th Legislative District.