‘We play hear,’ is a sign you might see a child holding when driving by St. George’s Park during the evening.
While misspelled, the neighbourhood children aim to get a message across, to stop speeding on the surrounding roads. The children can also be heard chanting ‘stay close, stay safe, to keep all the people safe.’
“It's noisy sometimes, it's very fast and gives a whish of wind, and I don't like when people go really fast. Sometimes I just get angry about it,” says 10-year-old Maddy Imrie who has been standing on Metcalfe Street daily trying to get cars to slow down.
She said she wants two things to be done for children in the local area: to decrease the speed limit and to install a crosswalk for kids to safely get to the park.
© 2021 - Village MediaMaddy’s mother Jessica Imrie, who lives on Metcalfe Street across St. George’s Park, said cars speeding through the streets around the park have been an ongoing problem for years, bringing much concern to parents in the neighborhood who have younger children playing outside at the park.
“They’re there almost every night, they hang out there a lot during the day, and unfortunately Metcalfe Street which we live on facing the park is just this 50 zone and it's quite a big increase from the school zone that's a 30 zone,” said Jessica.
“So what happens is we have a school zone that ends and then you hit the park and cars will just absolutely fly through our streets, and we have not a single crosswalk to access our park. So the children who live in the neighborhood don't have a safe way to cross the streets.”
She said the city recently said it would decrease the speed limit to 40km/h but it doesn’t seem enough. With cars parked on both sides of the streets, Jessica said children poke their heads out between cars to watch for oncoming traffic when crossing the road to the park.
Jessica said parents have recently been complaining about this issue a lot and nothing was being done about it so they made their own signs with children, held them up and even planted them on neighbours’ property and lampposts just so cars could stop.
With election season going on, Jessica said a lot of people are probably not going to pay attention to signs. With children holding hand made signs and chanting, she said many cars have slowed down.
“The children have also put a personal message in so some of them say we play here, or keep us safe.
“I was chanting about what I felt was right," said Maddy.
Maddy said when she chants with her friends, she gets waves, smiles and honks.
Jessica said the neighbours have been very supportive seeing that something is being done to raise awareness about the speeding issue.
Maddy said sometimes she worries about children younger than her across the street who want to get to the park.
“Sometimes they ask why I always remind them to watch the road. Sometimes they'll be like okay, it's the time to cross, and then we start to cross and then we see a car and I'm like no it's not time to cross,” said Maddy.
