Time for school: Take the safety quiz

With classes beginning in Worland next week, Ten Sleep and other schools later this month, it is time for some review so we can all be ready for school.

What do you do when you are driving and see a school bus with lights flashing the stop sign arm out? That is correct. You stop. It does not matter if you are behind the bus or approaching from the other direction, you must stop.

You are probably thinking everyone knows this and you would be correct but if my recollection is correct we had several citations last year for people passing school buses. The most in recent memory.

While we know this from driver’s education or our driver’s test sometimes we forget. Perhaps we think we only need to stop if we are behind the bus, but that is incorrect. You see buses stop on the correct side of the highway but a child might have to cross that highway, that is why both directions of traffic must stop.

Ok, next safety question. What is the speed limit in school zones? Correct, it is 20 mph sometimes that is during school hours, sometimes it is when lights are flashing. You need to pay attention.

This next one is tricky. Do you always stop for pedestrians? By state statute you must stop for pedestrians at any crosswalk (marked or unmarked) thus at any intersection.

Per state statute, “Every pedestrian crossing a roadway at any point other than within a marked crosswalk or within an unmarked crosswalk at an intersection shall yield the right-of-way to all vehicles upon the roadway.”

We all need to be on the lookout for students, teachers or any other pedestrians and stop when we can. The tricky part is if you stop in one direction but traffic coming from the other direction does not. Thus that is why the statute is in place requiring pedestrians to yield to traffic if they are not crossing at a crosswalk.

As the school year gets underway it is a good reminder for vehicles and pedestrians to watch out for one another.

OK no more quiz questions but a few more safety reminders. While state statute requires “every person operating a bicycle upon a roadway shall ride as near to the right side of the roadway as practicable,” we know that some young people do not always abide by those traffic rules so we, as drivers of motor vehicles, need to watch out for them.

Yes there are rules and regulations governing bicyclists and pedestrians and for their safety it is best if they adhere to those, but for drivers it behooves us to watch out for other drivers, pedestrians and bicyclists. Remember driving is a privilege. We need to be alert and not distracted.

I remember one year my dad said he had to take a defensive driving course for the Bureau of Land Management. I asked why, because as a child that’s what we ask. He said because as a driver you have control of what you do but you do not control and cannot predict what other drivers will do.

You also cannot predict what a bicyclist or pedestrian (no matter the age) may do.

We wish everyone a great school year and may we all drive, ride and walk safely to our destinations.