Post by title1parent on Jul 10, 2009 5:41:32 GMT -5
www.suburbanchicagonews.com/napervillesun/news/1660156,D203-breakdown-North-High-work_na071009.article
D203 gives breakdown of North High work
July 10, 2009
By TIM WALDORF twaldorf@scn1.com
The work was called for in and outlined prior to last year's facilities referendum.
But, now that Naperville North High School's parking lots look like quarries, people are wondering what's going on.
"They see everything all ripped up, and they're wondering, 'Well, are you just paving the whole site?'" said Craig Williams, Naperville School District 203's chief information officer. "We're actually not."
Nor is District 203 just ripping up perfectly good pavement to put new stuff down.
"I do think people sort of missed this in the PR deal," Williams said. "Even though we did focus on all four projects, I think everybody looked at Central."
So here's your refresher: the district is redesigning the way traffic moves through the site to address safety issues and traffic problems that have plagued the campus for years.
"There's not a lot of change at the curb cuts," Williams said of the project the district is tackling this summer. "It's more about what happens on the site, trying to improve the circulation within it."
Prior to this project, students coming and going from its southern and western lots — which are adjacent to North's auditorium and athletic department, respectively — had to cross busy driveways driven by students entering and leaving the site at Ogden Avenue, and buses doing the same via its southern Mill Street entrances.
These conflicts have long worried administrators, who have envisioned students being hit as they step out from behind a loading bus or into the path of traffic racing around or toward the right-in-right out at Ogden.
"That was a very real concern," Williams said. "Hopefully this will alleviate a lot of that."
The new design eliminates those pedestrian conflicts by immediately re-directing Ogden traffic to the edges of the site, and by creating a new bus drop-off and pick-up area on the school's eastern edge.
"So we basically take that whole issue of crossing a drive to get to your car and take it out of the mix," Williams concluded.
Up front — near the southwest corner of Ogden and Mill — the district is redesigning the area where parents drop off and pick up students. It is elongating the loop in front of its main entrance to give traffic entering the campus off Mill more space to queue up. The district hopes this will keep traffic from backing up on Mill during the morning and afternoon rush.
In this area, the district is also recovering the parking it lost to the bus loop. A new lot will be added just north of the parent pick-up and drop-off area.
This area is also where the district plans to recover some of the landscaping lost to the plan. After providing residents an opportunity to salvage all of the plants they wanted, the district had to plow over a prairie restoration project in order to create this new lot. But, stressed Williams, plans call for the planting of new trees and greenery in the area.
"We're going to have a kind of boulevard look," he said.
Other more subtle tweaks to the site include the creation of parking places for athletics buses adjacent to the football field, the smoothing out of the rather steep drives connecting the upper and lower levels of the southern parking lot, and, just past Fifth Avenue, the application of additional road striping to make a left-turn lane into the site for northbound traffic on Mill.
"It's going to take some education and stuff to get everyone acquainted with the new feel of everything," said Ralph Weaver, the district's director of facilities and construction.
Weaver said construction crews had fallen about a week behind on this project due to rain, but it should still be finished in time for the first day of school, Aug. 19.
Until then, the district is telling visitors to North to use the auditorium entrance on the southern side of the school until today, and then use the front entrance until the project is complete.
D203 gives breakdown of North High work
July 10, 2009
By TIM WALDORF twaldorf@scn1.com
The work was called for in and outlined prior to last year's facilities referendum.
But, now that Naperville North High School's parking lots look like quarries, people are wondering what's going on.
"They see everything all ripped up, and they're wondering, 'Well, are you just paving the whole site?'" said Craig Williams, Naperville School District 203's chief information officer. "We're actually not."
Nor is District 203 just ripping up perfectly good pavement to put new stuff down.
"I do think people sort of missed this in the PR deal," Williams said. "Even though we did focus on all four projects, I think everybody looked at Central."
So here's your refresher: the district is redesigning the way traffic moves through the site to address safety issues and traffic problems that have plagued the campus for years.
"There's not a lot of change at the curb cuts," Williams said of the project the district is tackling this summer. "It's more about what happens on the site, trying to improve the circulation within it."
Prior to this project, students coming and going from its southern and western lots — which are adjacent to North's auditorium and athletic department, respectively — had to cross busy driveways driven by students entering and leaving the site at Ogden Avenue, and buses doing the same via its southern Mill Street entrances.
These conflicts have long worried administrators, who have envisioned students being hit as they step out from behind a loading bus or into the path of traffic racing around or toward the right-in-right out at Ogden.
"That was a very real concern," Williams said. "Hopefully this will alleviate a lot of that."
The new design eliminates those pedestrian conflicts by immediately re-directing Ogden traffic to the edges of the site, and by creating a new bus drop-off and pick-up area on the school's eastern edge.
"So we basically take that whole issue of crossing a drive to get to your car and take it out of the mix," Williams concluded.
Up front — near the southwest corner of Ogden and Mill — the district is redesigning the area where parents drop off and pick up students. It is elongating the loop in front of its main entrance to give traffic entering the campus off Mill more space to queue up. The district hopes this will keep traffic from backing up on Mill during the morning and afternoon rush.
In this area, the district is also recovering the parking it lost to the bus loop. A new lot will be added just north of the parent pick-up and drop-off area.
This area is also where the district plans to recover some of the landscaping lost to the plan. After providing residents an opportunity to salvage all of the plants they wanted, the district had to plow over a prairie restoration project in order to create this new lot. But, stressed Williams, plans call for the planting of new trees and greenery in the area.
"We're going to have a kind of boulevard look," he said.
Other more subtle tweaks to the site include the creation of parking places for athletics buses adjacent to the football field, the smoothing out of the rather steep drives connecting the upper and lower levels of the southern parking lot, and, just past Fifth Avenue, the application of additional road striping to make a left-turn lane into the site for northbound traffic on Mill.
"It's going to take some education and stuff to get everyone acquainted with the new feel of everything," said Ralph Weaver, the district's director of facilities and construction.
Weaver said construction crews had fallen about a week behind on this project due to rain, but it should still be finished in time for the first day of school, Aug. 19.
Until then, the district is telling visitors to North to use the auditorium entrance on the southern side of the school until today, and then use the front entrance until the project is complete.