School Traffic is Ridiculous

How COVID and poor planing is affecting CKHS traffic

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Johnathan Haselman-Chance

a photo of Central Kitsap High School’s after school traffic. taken at 2:43 on Thursday October 28 ,2021.

Ever since Central Kitsap High School reopened its doors for the 2021-2022 school year on September 1st, traffic on NW Anderson Hill Rd. has not been the same.

Now with school back in session, by 7:30 am and shortly after 2:35 pm on any weekday, NW Anderson Hill Rd. is impossible to drive through.

All this traffic impacts parents’ ability to have more time to attend to other things. Some parents have been seen lining up as early as 1:40 p.m. to pick up their kids almost an hour later.

Not only does this traffic affect parents, but takes time away from students that could be spent on extracurricular activities, homework, or an after school job.  

In the morning the CK traffic creates a situation that requires careful planning to be sure you get to school on time.

As a student driver, Mathew Wallen describes it “The school’s traffic has always given me a certain timezone, where I have to arrive before this if I ever want to consider getting into the school before my math teacher calls me absent.”

The main reason for the congestion of the CK high parking lot is the inclusion of only one entrance and exit for the entire school. This fact combined with about 1500 students attending CK leads to major congestion.

This is all well summarized by Ed Garrity, bus driver for CK Schools, “I think that we have a lot of people in a consolidated area, at a certain couple of times a day.” 

While the traffic is irritating, and there may be ways to mitigate it, as Mr. Wallen says, “it’s not life threatening, it’s just time wasting.”