YORBA LINDA : Stop Sign Urged Where Child Died

Nearly 50 Fairmont Private School parents pleaded with the City Council to install a stop sign and a crosswalk in the middle of a block of Valley View Drive where a motorist fatally struck a child and seriously injured two others nearly a year ago.

In a emotional meeting Tuesday, the parents and a school administrator called for the council to place a crosswalk in front of the school so the students can reach a park across the street more safely.

They also lobbied for a stop sign at the intersection of Valley View Drive and Orange Avenue.

“It is something that can save some lives,” said David Jackson, executive director of Fairmont Schools, which is based in Anaheim. “I can’t change the past, but I surely can do something to try to change the future.”

Three Fairmont School students were struck at dusk last Nov. 8 while they were returning to the school from Valley View Youth Park. They were crossing Valley View Avenue in single file in a section of the street not marked by a crosswalk, with their teacher at the head of the line. Ravi Patel, 6, a first-grader, died several days later.

Council members voted to have the Traffic Commission review the proposals at a meeting next month.

Several parents became bitter when Mayor Mark Schwing, trying to move on to other agenda items, said that the council could take no more action and that additional comments should be made before the Traffic Commission.

Some parents pleaded to the council from the back of the chamber. “You have a closed mind,” Ravi Patel’s mother, Sheila Patel, said in a trembling voice. “This is a plea to you. This is a plea to you coming from the other children who are there.”

Earlier this year, the Patels filed a claim seeking $1 million in damages from the city for what the couple allege was the dangerous condition of the road before the accident, including the lack of a crosswalk or a school-zone sign. Caltrans, Fairmont Schools, Jackson and Ravi Patel’s teacher were also named in the suit.

City officials say that all along they have followed a state system that outlines at what volumes certain traffic controls are needed. Traffic counts conducted before and after the accident show that the volume is still not great enough on the street to make a stop sign necessary, City Engineer Roy Stephenson said.

“If we start reacting emotionally to these things without applying good engineering, we can get into trouble,” he said.

The situation could change in December, when a 73,500-square-foot Smith’s Food and Drug store is expected to open just down the street from the school. Its developers have agreed to place a deposit to pay for a stop sign or stop signal if warranted by an increase in traffic.

But even with an increase in traffic, city officials have opposed crosswalks in the middle of the block, saying they can create a “false sense of security” for pedestrians.