Hello, my name is Christian Cavener. Mercy Park is such a beautiful park, isn’t it? Vast walkways and that pond; a beautiful sight to behold. Many folks, especially adults, take advantage of those walkways and beautiful views by walking around the park. Some even hop right across 26th street to go to Cunningham Park during their time spent in the area. There’s even a stoplight system to assist pedestrians who are walking from Mercy Park to Cunningham Park. There are quite a few students going across 20th street after school. There is only one problem; right after school, 20th street is usually filled with cars going east and west. With a large group of students crossing such a busy road, it seems logical that there would be some sort of system to help slow traffic down to assist students, minors who walk across the street. I don’t know, maybe something like Mercy Park has. A way to slow cars down that are sometimes going upwards of 40 MPH from hitting teens. If a park can have a stoplight, I think students can have one too. There are numerous examples of near-miss moments where students nearly got hit by cars going down 20th street. This doesn’t even take into account the disorderly conduct of numerous drivers during drop off. Drivers creating multiple lanes, parking on sidewalks, drivers intimidating students, near-miss moments of drivers almost hitting students, near-miss moments of drivers almost hitting other drivers, etc. An easy fix to this would be to simply implement new road signs and painted directions on the road to Joplin High School to more efficiently direct traffic. We will be taking this petition to the Joplin City Council on September 7th at 6 P.M. Everyone is welcome because it is a public meeting.