Crosswalk safety has become a grow­ing issue on cam­pus since the death of a Ferris stu­dent in a pedestrian-vehicle acci­dent last October.

Vice President of Administration and Finance and chair of the Pedestrian Safety Task Force Committee, Jerry Scoby, said the task force has held three meet­ings so far to dis­cuss solu­tions that will improve cross­walk safety on campus.

“Basically we’re try­ing to get input if any peo­ple want to weigh in on this topic and share their views,” said Scoby.

A Facebook page for the cross­walk pedes­trian safety task­force was cre­ated in order for stu­dents to share their thoughts and ideas on the issue.

Scoby hopes more stu­dents will par­tic­i­pate in voic­ing their thoughts on cross­walk safety. During the Dec. 10 meet­ing, he said par­tic­i­pa­tion was “very light.”

“We don’t have a struc­tural prob­lem, we have an edu­ca­tion prob­lem; we need to edu­cate dri­vers as well,” said Scoby.

Pedestrian safety has been a strong topic of dis­cus­sion among Student Government. Claire Gould, President of Student Government and mem­ber of the Pedestrian Safety Task Force Committee, said they have been work­ing on areas of con­cern for pedes­tri­ans on cam­pus and dis­cussing solu­tions to make Ferris safer and then work­ing to imple­ment those solutions.

A pro­posal to put up a raised cross­walk over State Street is a sug­ges­tion that has been offered by mem­bers of the taskforce.

“We’re still in the idea gath­er­ing stage,” said Scoby. He said many mem­bers of the task force in addi­tion have offered ideas such as a bridge tunnel.

Gould said Student Government is now work­ing along­side DPS and help­ing them deter­mine a count of pedes­trian travel near Morrison Street and on State Street to the south along the front of Burger King, Qdoba and Rite Aid.

The infor­ma­tion would be used by MDOT to ini­ti­ate fur­ther review of the loca­tion to make it safer for dri­vers and pedestrians.

“Pedestrian safety is also a major issue for the Student Government Campus Affairs Committee,” said Gould. The com­mit­tee con­structed a 30-page doc­u­ment of the dif­fer­ent cross­walks on cam­pus and safety eval­u­a­tions for each one that will be deter­mined by stu­dents. A final rec­om­men­da­tion will be made as to what should be done.

The doc­u­ment will be pre­sented to the task­force this week in ref­er­ence to mak­ing a decision.

Scoby said other sug­ges­tions to increase pedestrian-crosswalk safety include adding dif­fer­ent signs.

“We have iden­ti­fied the process of adding dif­fer­ent cross­walks,” he said. The three major areas are South State Street in front of the busi­ness build­ing, the Starr build­ing and Helen Ferris hall, and the drive between the Rankin Center and Carlisle Hall.

“Those are some areas we’ll be spend­ing time and energy on,” said Scoby.

The task­force and Student Government will be host­ing an open forum/discussion about pedes­trian safety on Tuesday, Jan. 19 from 11–11:50 a.m. in IRC 120. The forum is open to stu­dents, fac­ulty, staff and com­mu­nity mem­bers. Posters for the event will be going up next week. Gould and Scoby are hop­ing for a good turnout.

“This is the time that any­one can voice their opin­ion and let the uni­ver­sity know what areas need to be changed and ideas that they have on mak­ing cam­pus safer,” said Gould.