Students, staff talk pedestrian safety on MU campus

Syed Ejaz took a walk around campus. He, and the others from the Missouri Student Assoication, were not looking for anything in particular. They wanted to see if anything stood out to them as a pedestrian on the campus, and some of the struggles that sometimes comes with it.

Ejaz spoke about these struggles, and what he hopes the University does in response, to the Mayor’s Task Force on Pedestrian Safety Tuesday afternoon. Columbia Mayor Bob McDavid asked when he formed the task force for a session specific to the University, which MUPD said had 11 pedestrian accidents in the 2014 school year.

Ejaz pinpointed problems with the “closed campus” portions of the University. Currently, only stretches of Rollins St. by the Student Center, Hitt Street by Memorial Union and Conley Avenue by Speaker’s Circle restrict traffic to buses and University-owned vehicles. Ejaz said the sometimes confusing placement of the “closed campus” barriers can cause some drivers to bypass them into areas with hundreds of students trying to quickly make it to their next destination.

“Once they accidentally, or intentionally, enter closed campus, you have pedestrians asking ‘Why are they here?’,” Ejaz told ABC 17 News. “Or, they’re not asking that, and their on their phones and they’re not paying attention to the traffic situation.”

Ejaz hoped the University would expand closed campus to connect the existing sections, and make the area a safer space for pedestrians.

He said he and MSA would focus on curbing both distracted driving and distracted walking on campus.

“If the pedestrian isn’t looking out for cars, and the car isn’t looking out for the pedestrian, that’s a really bad situation,” Ejaz said.

University of Missouri Police Chief Doug Schwandt said of the 11 pedestrian accidents in the last school year, six of them happened at crosswalks, and two of them on sidewalks. Two of those 11 accidents happened at the corner of College Ave. and Rollins St., an area Ejaz said he wanted to see improvements. He cited the 16-second timer for crossing College Ave. as too short, especially since students come from the closed campus portion of Rollins St. and think they are safe from traffic. Ejaz said if the pedestrian scramble project at Ninth Street and Elm Street in downtown Columbia was successful in moving pedestrians and traffic along quickly and safely, he would ask the University put in the same at that intersection.

The Mayor’s Task Force on Pedestrian Safety will meet in September to discuss issues for Columbia Public School students.