Although having a brand new elementary school in the neighborhood has its advantages, parents of students assigned to Red Pump Elementary School north of Bel Air still have some concerns.
As a rule, the Harford County Board of Education implemented a policy that requires students living within one mile of a school to walk, according to the school system communications office. Even in some cases where a large neighborhood has homes more than a mile away, the non-busing policy allows buses to pick up those students, but not other ones in the same development who are within a mile.
Several parents in the Brentwood Park development, which feeds into Red Pump, have expressed concerns and frustrations about this policy.
"It's difficult to understand why they can't send the buses for all of them," Melina Donna, a Brentwood Park resident, said.
Donna has one child going to Red Pump, a second grade student, who she said she does not feel comfortable sending her to walk on her own.
Unlike other walks to elementary schools, Donna said the walk from Brentwood Park to Red Pump is not an "easy walk." Even though there are sidewalks, she added, they are not all on the same side in the development, requiring the children to switch sides during their daily walk.
Her daughter, too, would have to walk along Vale Road before reaching either of the two crossing guards that the Harford County Sheriff's Office has commissioned for the route.
Crossing guards will be at Vale and Red Pump roads to help students cross Vale, and also at the roundabout by Red Pump Road and Yankee Doodle Drive, according to the school system. The guards will be at those locations during arrival and dismissals to and from the school.
The Red Pump and Vale intersection is controlled by four-way stop signs.
Even with the crossing guards, though, parents believe the walk will be too dangerous.
"Her getting to the crosswalk is a difficult walk," Donna said.
Donna added she does not have enough time to walk with her daughter and will more than likely drive her to the school. One of her neighbors, Shannon Langlotz, too, said she would have to drive her children, who are in second, third and fifth grades.
"We're going to end up driving them and then it's going to be a traffic nightmare every morning," she said.
In her area of Brentwood Park, Langlotz said, her children would have to cross eight roads before reaching the crossing guards. Although two of them are just courts, four of them are major roads.
Another danger of the walk not being a straight stop, she added, was the possibility of her children being kidnapped. Once her son rounds the first corner, she said, he has several more to go and all with limited visibility.
"What's going to stop somebody from driving up and just snatching him?" she asked.
Both women also mentioned the manner in which the school system was measuring for the mile rule.
Doorway-to-doorway, they said, their homes were just more than a mile from Red Pump, with Langlotz's in particular at 1.1 miles away. But the school system, she said, measures from the top of the roundabout, which is the edge of the school system property, putting her at 0.9 miles away.
"It's really frustrating," she added.
She and Donna both walked the route themselves, Langlotz said, and even at a "brisk" pace, it took the two 35 minutes to get to the school and 35 minutes to get back. With that amount of time, students wouldn't get back home from school until after 4 p.m.
Parents have sent letters to the Harford County Board of Education and have also spoken to school system transportation officials about the issue, with all assuring them the walk is safe.
Another parent, Brandy Vinson, said her husband filed a request with the Maryland Public Information Act, asking for traffic studies in the area, as well as the decision-making process when determining if a child has to walk or will ride a bus.
The school system's legal department responded last week, she said, and asked them to make a more specific request so Vinson, who has a child in second grade, said they are working on narrowing down their requests.
Langlotz did acknowledge that Brentwood Park is a large development, with more than 400 single family homes, as well as condos and townhouses, so transporting all of the students who live in the community would require more than one bus. But for her, walking is a "huge safety issue."
"We [were] very happy this new school was coming in, but the transportation…," she paused. "Never in a million years did any of us think we would be walkers."