Kids Crossing Street to Webster Elementary Have More Room to Wait in Median

Urbandale city leaders changed where students walking to Urbandale’s Webster Elementary School will cross a street, giving them more room to safely wait in the median, the Des Moines Register reports.

The new route approved at the July 23 city council meeting will have students cross Northwest 128th Street at the intersection with Aurora Avenue instead of at Valdez Drive to the north, the newspaper said.

In the new location, there’s a sidewalk that crosses on the median, giving more space for kids to wait before crossing the next lane, Dave McKay, the city’s director of engineering and public works, told the council.

“There’s a bigger place for the kids to be stored in the middle,” he said in the Register story. “The crossing guard likes that, feels a lot safer.”

The city also plans to install a traffic light at the intersection next year, the Register reports, to make the crossing even safer.