With the aim of preventing the occurrence of road accidents in the vicinity of schools and kindergartens in the country, the National Traffic Safety Commission (Conaset) together with Buses Vule and Automóvil Club de Chile, inaugurated new road improvement works in areas educational centers of the communes of Lo Espejo and Puente Alto, and which are part of the expansion plan of the global “Star Rating for Schools” program throughout the Metropolitan Region to create safe school environments.
This international project, which is present in 52 countries and has benefited more than 900 schools around the world, seeks to give educational establishments the opportunity to implement a series of free road solutions that allow minimizing the occurrence of accidents and road incidents. that a school community may be involved, taking as a starting point the trips made to and from schools.
For these new interventions, two educational establishments were selected that are located in the vicinity of the terminals operated by the public transport company Buses Vule, one of the main operators of the RED system in Santiago. The first of them was the San Lucas de Lo Espejo School, which currently has more than 900 students.
“We are aware of the importance of transporting the inhabitants of Santiago to their destinations, making 20 million trips through 28 communes of the Metropolitan Region, but we also understand that this responsibility goes beyond mere mobilization; It also implies being agents of change, both in the system, promoting good behaviors and habits, and in the field of education, instilling notions of road safety in new generations. “This program has a material part, which is the improvements in infrastructure surrounding the schools that are our neighbors, and it also has a fundamental aspect that consists of workshops and educational sessions to make good use of those same roads that we are helping to improve,” said Antonio. Villalobos, Deputy Manager of Finance and Public Affairs of Buses Vule.
As explained by María Ignacia González, executive director of the Automobile Club of Chile, “The reality of children’s road safety in the country is truly dramatic, even more so when road accidents have become the first cause of external death of children and young people. This public-private project not only evaluates and communicates the dangers to which a school community is exposed, but also provides concrete road solutions to the establishments and communities where they are located so that there are urban radios capable of guaranteeing safe mobility for “all those who move through these educational environments.”
According to the projections of the Automobile Club of Chile, in the next five years they expect to intervene in more than 100 educational establishments in the country, mainly in those communities that have high rates of road accidents. Since this initiative was launched at the end of 2023, there are already five educational facilities in the Metropolitan Region that have benefited from these road improvements.
The details of the works carried out so far are:
San Lucas School, Lo Espejo:
In this school environment, a raised crossing was redone, warning beacons were installed for the safe movement of pedestrians, and a series of vertical traffic signs were also modified and added in the sector, including stop and yield disk signs. passage, school zone and maximum speeds of 30 km/h. Also, road demarcation works and maintenance of pedestrian fences were carried out to create safer routes in the sector.
Path of Knowledge School, Puente Alto:
In the case of the other school benefiting from this initiative, the Senda del Saber School in the Puente Alto commune, a crossing with bumps was installed, the potholes found on the roads adjacent to the campus were covered, and the presence of surface signage to benefit the movement of the more than a thousand students that make up this school community. In addition, they took advantage of painting roads and sidewalks in order to make visible the presence of students in the sector, as well as installing recreational and rest real estate for those who regularly pass through this school area.
