The Safe Routes to School team acts as the bridge between the Portland Bureau of Transportation (PBOT) and schools when they have traffic congestion issues or student safety concerns, particularly during arrival and dismissal. Our staff along with PBOT traffic engineers analyze traffic patterns and driver behavior during these peak hours to determine whether the problem is behavioral, structural, or both. We then work with school leadership to mitigate these issues with a mix of education and infrastructure improvements.
Our team can support circulation at nearly a dozen schools each school year. We prioritize schools we have not supported in recent years, and focus on those identified as high-need using PBOT's Equity Matrix and the Oregon Department of Transportation Safe Routes to School resource tool.
If your school could use support with circulation during arrival and dismissal, please encourage your principal to contact us at saferoutes@portlandoregon.gov.
Different ways to address circulation issues
We use several tools to address school circulation and student safety issues, including:
- Creating a circulation map the school can distribute to their school community as a physical map and through school newsletters and blog posts
- Crafting messages for schools to send to parents and caregivers to reinforce safe driving habits
- Promoting pedestrian and bike safety educationin classrooms through our train the trainer model
- Recommending minor safety improvementsto surrounding infrastructure, e.g., marked crosswalks, signage changes, and parking setbacks
Collectively, these kinds of improvements help with pedestrian visibility at intersections, reduce congestion at school entrances, and help incentivize kids to walk, bike, and roll to school.
Creating a circulation map
Circulation maps are a great addition to back to school bus, walk and roll information.
We're also big fans of Seattle Department of Transportation's Safe Routes to School program, and highly recommend looking through their toolkit for ideas and recommendations.
Crafting messages
We work with schools directly to craft messages that are specific to each school community's circulation issues. Clear expectations can help caretakers practice good driving habits during pick-up and drop-off. We want to make sure caretakers understand where you want them and where you don’t.
Our Safe Routes to School program can also support parking issues that may occur during arrival and dismissal times. Please visit our parking education page to review available materials that support parking management near campus.
Promoting pedestrian and bike safety education
Core to work, we collaborate with schools to help bring transportation safety skills to classrooms across Portland, including:
- Pedestrian safety education
- Elementary school physical education (PE) classes
- Games and movement to teach pedestrian skills and personal safety so that students feel safe getting where they need to go free from threat and fear of emotional, psychological, and physical harm
- Bike safety education
- Elementary and middle school PE classes
- Bike handling skills and road safety awareness in both classroom and outdoor settings
- Transportation safety education
- Middle school health classes
- Health and community benefits of walking, biking, and rolling; crash prevention; road etiquette; Oregon traffic safety laws; how to ride transit; and assertive communication in public spaces
- Transportation Academy
- High school interdisciplinary classes
- Encourages growth beyond the classroom and into students’ day-to-day lives; covers different options for students to get around their neighborhood and city; and promotes traffic safety for walking, biking, rolling, and driving with the goal of reducing serious and deadly crashes
Recommending minor safety improvements
As part of our Safe Routes to School program, we are working hard to improve conditions for walking, biking, and rolling around schools. To request infrastructure near your school, we recommend contacting your principal. Safe Routes to School staff works directly with district and school staff regarding school traffic safety concerns.
We prioritize investments in our Vision Zero highest-crash streets and intersections and Safe Routes to School Primary Investment Routes. Projects are constructed as funding is available and in coordination with Neighborhood Greenways and Fixing Our Streets programs. Projects are often identified and planned years in advance of construction.
To learn more about common Safe Routes to School safety tools, please review the Safe Routes to School Street Design Toolkit.
Success stories
Sacramento Elementary’s successful communications helped with circulation
The Safe Routes to School team helped Sacramento Elementary School’s Principal Sarah Lamb-Christensen solve some major issues she’d reported happening at her Parkrose school. The result: better communications and signage, support staff wearing high-visibility safety vests, and some education within the school to set expectations and improve traffic safety during arrival and dismissal. This started with a map sent to families at the beginning of the year with routes. Along with the map, Principal Lamb- Christensen said it’s so important to help families understand the why: “every family wants their kids to be safe and that helps get people on board.” For dismissal, staff work together to shuffle students to the pickup area, where they meet parents and caregivers with name placards and grades on their dashboards. Placards serves a dual purpose: to help staff meet family members, which speeds up the pickup process, and ensures the correct adults are picking up students. Principal Lamb-Christensen recommends that schools give grace to families as they are learning and adapting to change. “Our business is all about relationships. Families learn quickly that if you don’t follow the traffic flow it takes a lot longer.”
Getting families in and out smoother and faster at Shaver Elementary
Safe Routes to School visited Shaver Elementary School to study circulation and pedestrian safety. Our team investigated additional crossings and suggested routing cars through a school driveway loop for drop-off and pickup. After we visited the school for outreach and the Parkrose School District made our recommended changes, Shaver Principal Melanie Zecca told us how the new system is working. “It’s going really well! Most families are appreciative and traffic flows pretty quickly… We are definitely seeing things much smoother now… Both the second crossing area and the driveway loop are well used.”
School Streets Pilot Evaluation Findings: 2023-24 School Year
The School Streets Pilot Evaluation Findings: 2023-24 School Year describes findings from the Portland Bureau of Transportation (PBOT) and Portland Public Schools (PPS) evaluation of School Streets for the 2023-2024 school year across five pilot schools: Astor K-8, Beach Elementary, Kellogg Middle, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Elementary, and Peninsula Elementary.
What is a School Street?
PBOT and PPS partnered to pilot School Streets in 2021 in response to Covid-19 protocols as students returned to school in person. The pilot program defined School Streets as a local access only block (or two blocks) adjacent to a school that has signs in the right-of-way to redirect vehicle traffic during the morning arrival and afternoon dismissal. School buses or district transportation services were permitted on School Streets.
The program goals were to:
- Create a safer environment for students and families during arrival and dismissal
- Calm traffic congestion at school entrances
- Encourage more students and families to walk, bike, or roll to school, or park and walk
- Create community connections through public spaces
In response to school interest, the pilot program was extended year over year.
Key takeaways
The implementation of School Streets at each pilot school varied, and none of the pilot schools implemented their School Street in the way PBOT and PPS staff had originally intended. This evaluation sought to understand how and why there were differences in how School Streets were implemented. Reasons varied from not having dedicated staff time to move street signs in and out of the street at arrival and dismissal, having a limited understanding of how School Streets should function, and school leadership responsiveness to school community attitudes and behaviors.
Each school adapted the School Street program to fit their culture and access needs:
- Astor K-8: School Street signs were stationary in the edges of the street, and although signs discouraged through traffic, many vehicles traveled the street.
- Beach Elementary: School Street signs were stationary in the edges of the street, although signs discouraged through traffic, some vehicles traveled the street.
- Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Elementary: The School Street was terminated after its initial rollout and signs were removed by school staff. The street became the primary pickup and drop-off location for buses and vehicles alike.
- Kellogg Middle: Two School Streets were originally located on SE 69th Avenue and Franklin Street. SE 69th Avenue was removed since it is the primary access street for vehicles turning off Powell Boulevard. SE Franklin Street had hardly any vehicle traffic and many students walking in the street.
- Peninsula Elementary: School staff and student safety patrol moved the School Street signs into the street to block all other traffic while buses loaded and unloaded.
Given these variations, interpretation of evaluation findings must consider that “School Streets” did not have a consistent appearance or function.
School principals or building leaders from four of the five pilot schools (80%) said they would like “School Streets” to continue, even though their interpretations of the program varied considerably, and a couple schools did not use the School Street signage. Among school community members surveyed, a majority (70%) also indicated they would like “School Streets” to continue. When asked to elaborate, the features of School Streets people were interested to see continue include:
- Protected loading/unloading zones for buses that reduce conflicts with other parked vehicles, through traffic, and/or families’ short-term parking.
- Designated circulation patterns for students and families depending on how they travel (e.g., one-way travel for people driving, recommended park and walk locations, bike bus routes and parking).
- Visible, low-maintenance signage that brings awareness to people traveling through the area and that it is a school zone where one should expect to see school children in the street. A couple school leaders would prefer signage to be large and semi-permanent such that it doesn’t need to be moved by staff or crossing guards and serves as a diverter for vehicles.
Equal numbers of school principals and survey respondents felt School Streets either improved safety, kept it the same, or weren’t sure. Only one respondent thought safety worsened since School Streets had school bus traffic on them. Regarding traffic congestion impacts, responses were mixed. Other supportive actions schools took to address student safety and traffic congestion include:
- Dispersed school entrances/exits around the school or by grade help limit traffic pinch points.
- Frequent communication about circulation patterns to families via newsletters. Communications should include maps with arrows and relevant messaging about where drop-off or pick-up should occur.
What's next?
The School Streets program is paused and not accepting new requests. The Safe Routes to School team is currently re-evaluating, working to secure financial resources, and exploring policy options before delivery an updated version of the program in the future.
Read the School Streets Pilot Evaluation Findings: 2023-24 School Year