BISD PROPOSES PARTIAL RESPONSE TO HUDSON ELEMENTARY BOTTLENECK

By Juan Montoya

Reacting to a sudden spate of news stories surrounding the heavy traffic congestion and bottleneck at Hudson Elementary School off FM 802, the Brownsville Independent School District facilities department will recommend that a partial solution to the single ingress-egress road to the school be implemented.

A staffer at the Facilities department told El Rrun-Rrrun that they will recommend to the board next week that a road that will loop within the school grounds be constructed to alleviate the bottleneck created during peak hours when students are dropped off and picked up by buses and parents.

"We have gone out to the site and inspected the house behind the school that the district bough years ago when this came up and we're going to recommend that it be demolished," he said. "We aren't going to recommend that an exit be built there onto Draper Drive, but that the walkway be enlarged and that the portables on the east side of the school be moved so that we can construct a loop to keep the traffic circulating."

A former school board member said he was there when the home in question at 115 Draper Drive was purchased by the district with the plan to build an exit through the rear of the school property.

However, opposition from Hudson and some of the residents on Draper Drive killed the idea,' he said.

"There was some problem about Hudson not wanting to relinquish and easement and some of the neighbors on Draper Drive didn't want any traffic from the school even though their kids attend the school."

A resident on Concordia said that instead of half measures, the district should go ahead and build an additional ingress-egress through Draper Drive that would allow the free flow of traffic.

"It's a straight shot from Draper to Coffeeport Road," she said. "School buses already go through there to drop off children at their homes. There wouldn't be much of an impact. After school hours they could put a gate to prevent cars from going though there to the school."

The staffer from facilities said that there had been complaints from the neighbors on Draper because the law was overgrown and the boarded up house gave the neighborhood a run-down appearance. He said that complaints had been numerous because the condition of the house had deteriorated.

"We're going to recommend that it be demolished," he said. "But I don't think that we're going to recommend that an exit be built feeding into Draper. That's up to the board to decide."

The two tracts for the school were donated by developer William "Bill" Hudson in 1997. He then built the subdivisions around it. At the time he donated the land, no one could foresee that the single entrance and exit through Seville road would become congested with school traffic. Now, the neighbors in the subdivisions complain that they are not allowed t enter or exit their neighborhoods during the peak school hours.

They also say that the congestion and the single point of entry and exit makes it a potential death trap in case of a medical emergency or, even worse, a fire at the school or in nearby homes.

"Heaven forbid that something like that should happen," said a woman who lives on Concordia Drive. "If I become sick and need medical help, there's no way an ambulance is going to be able to get through the traffic to provide assistance. This was badly planned in the first place. It needs to get fixed now."