In an
unprecedented event, a diverse group of North Wichita residents
joined together in mid-January to demand that city officials address
dangerous traffic problems in their neighborhood.
While the north area of Wichita, KS is predominantly made up of
Hispanic residents, many of the civic groups who usually work on
neighborhood improvements for the area don’t represent the
neighborhood’s racial make-up. But Sunflower Community Action
was able to pull together a mix of blacks, Hispanics and whites
that never had worked together before around a common issue that
was putting all people in danger.
Northern Wichita is a congested area, with parked cars lining the
streets, stop signs obstructed from line of sight and speeding cars
whizzing around corners.
Members of the newly formed North Wichita Chapter of Sunflower Community
Action held their first public meeting to take on these problems.
They met with representatives from the city’s Traffic Department
and with the local police lieutenant. North Wichita Chapter leaders
demanded that specific intersections in the area receive concrete
improvements for safety.
“I’m concerned about the safety of my kids and grandkids.
It’s crazy the way some people drive around here,” said
resident and new leader Raquel Sosa.
Residents talked about how two of the three intersections in the
area had at least one fatality within the last two years. The mother
of one of the fatality victims, LeVeta Salome, gave a heartfelt
plea for action to be taken on these intersections.
“Something needs to be done to make these intersections safer,
so no one else has to go through what we go through everyday,”
Salome said.
Scott Logan, head of the Wichita’s Traffic Department, evaluated
each of the intersections 20 days after the public meeting. As a
result of this evaluation and persistence by the North Wichita Chapter,
improvements were made to each of the intersections of concern,
including yield signs changed to stop signs, reflective flags alerting
motorists of stop signs and reduced street parking.
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