Boston council panel pushes for expanded school safety zones at 66 priority schools

BOSTON — April 3, 2025 — Boston City Council committee examines overhaul of school safety zones amid 50 crossing guard vacancies and 12 pedestrian fatalities in 2024. The Committee on Planning, Development, and Transportation, chaired by Councilor Sharon Durkan, held a hearing Thursday on Docket 0309, sponsored by Councilors Enrique J. Pepén, John FitzGerald, and Edward M. Flynn. Sylvia Castaños, Safe Routes to School Planner at the Boston Transportation Department, presented a new 500-foot "school area" planning framework targeting 66 priority schools that each record more than one pediatric crash per year within a half mile. Mary Bovenzi of the Boston Public Health Commission told councilors that EMS logged 466 pedestrian injuries and 12 fatalities citywide in 2024 alone. Pepén called for the Safe Routes to School position to be made permanent and elevated to a BTD sub-department, while Flynn flagged roughly 50 unfilled crossing guard slots and asked for a review of bus double-parking near dismissal zones. A formal evaluation of the city's school traffic supervisor program — run through the Boston Police Department — is due within weeks.