District to change BRMS driveway

RIVER CLUB — The Manatee County School District already has begun work to improve traffic along River Club Boulevard next school year.

Half-Acre Construction started work last week to extend Braden River Middle School’s on-campus drive to take traffic off River Club’s main roadway during school dismissal times.

During the next two months, the contractor will be developing a straight east-west roadway along Braden River Middle’s southern boundary and adding a cul-de-sac at the end so parents waiting in their cars to pick up their students have a place to wait in their vehicles without blocking traffic on River Club Boulevard.

“The school district is taking an initiative on this,” said Mike Pendley, executive planner of facility planning and land acquisition. “We had received some complaints from local citizens who live in River Club. We went out and studied it and determined a way we could solve it.”

Pendley said the district’s studies showed southbound cars were cueing about 1,800 feet along River Club Boulevard, significantly more than at other schools.

“What that does is it prevents through traffic from continuing down River Club Boulevard during that dismissal time,” Pendley said. “We’re expanding the cuing area for cars for parents to pick up their students. Right now, there’s a very, very short cueing area.

“This will accommodate all the traffic that is currently cueing up on River Club Boulevard,” he said. “There may be a few cars in the turn lane, but that’s fine. They are out of the way of traffic.”

During dismissal, the school’s parking area will be blocked off, Pendley said.

“We will use some manually operated gates to control the flow of traffic,” he said. “If you come in most times of the day, you would not need to make that entire drive. You could just come in the parking lot. During dismissal, we will block off the parking lot.”

Braden River Principal Randy Petrilla said the project resolves a safety concern he and others have had for several years.

“What’s grown is the number of students who choice here,” Petrilla said. “Parents are being required to transport the student. It’s added some vehicles (to the roadway).”

Total costs for the project came in around $141,000 — well under the $180,000 budgeted for the improvement.

The district will not be making any changes to River Club Boulevard itself.

As an additional part of the project, Halfacre Construction also will be installing new acoustic panels in the school’s gymnasium. Petrilla said the gym’s original panels were removed last summer when the district repainted it, but they were not reinstalled.

“They ran out of time getting the school up and running,” Petrilla said. “They are putting the gym back the way it was.”

Contact Pam Eubanks at [email protected].