Driving in North Fulton Can Be Fun

By Jonathan Copsey/ STAFF

Above, children learn the bitter truth about driving in Roswell as they back up at a traffic light. Left, officer Tom Garcia of Roswell Police instructs children from Mimosa Elementary about personal safety at the Hembree park Gym.

It seems almost like a cruel joke to make children pretend they are on North Fulton’s parking lot roads, but that is exactly what has happened the last two weeks. And the kids of Roswell’s elementary schools have had a blast with the make-believe road rules program called “Safety Town.”

Safety Town is a national program that lets young children experience first-hand what it is like to drive on roads with other traffic. Using a miniature town complete with streets, stop signs, crosswalks and buildings, Safety Town allows the children to become familiar with signs and road safety while they drive around the town on tricycles. Those who aren’t driving walk along the sidewalks and learn what to do when they want to cross the road. Other groups speak with police and fire fighters about personal and fire safety.

While many other states have official Safety Town programs where all children (and even older kids learning driver’s education) take part, Georgia is sadly lacking. Roswell’s program was begun by Kelly Meer of the Meer Electric family.

"When I first thought of bringing this project to Roswell," said Meer, "someone said that I should call [Roswell Councilwoman] Lori Henry and ask her what she thinks; if we can make this into a program. And she had no idea what I was talking about.

"When I grew up, I went through Safety Town. And people in other states went through it. Talk to someone in Oklahoma and they would say ‘We don’t have problems with our teenage drivers because we have Safety Town.’ They know pretty much everything except how the car works by the time they get their license.’ I find that interesting because we have lots of problems with our teenage drivers. There’s talk of raising the driving age to 21 or 25 and in my opinion it doesn’t matter. If they don’t know it or didn’t practice it, they won’t know it no matter what age they are.”

“Georgia teenagers study their driver’s manual 15 minutes before taking their driving test,” she said, adding that Oklahoma and many other states have driver’s education in the high schools.

Some Safety Towns look like mini Walt Disney Worlds, with buildings connected and curbs and poles and awnings. Roswell’s is in the Hembree Park Gym and is built upon carpets. The buildings were built by local businesses and Roswell city departments. There is even a replica of Roswell City Hall, complete with clock.

“We took the two week [national] curriculum and condensed it to two hours,” said Roswell Recreation and Parks Superintendent Katie Troline, who helps run the program. “This allows us to bring in a massive amount of children, about 1,800 students ages four to six.”

Each one of these children goes through all four aspects of the program in their two hours: Drive, walk, and hear the police and fire departments speak.

“A fire fighter in full gear can be very frightening to a small child … by the end of the program they are hugging the fireman,” said Troline. "They get to go through the police car and sit in a fire truck. They love it.”

Because of the popularity and success of the temporary Safety Town, the organizers hope to one day have a permanent town somewhere in Roswell so that the program could run year-round. But that is still a long way off. For right now, they are just happy to have their two weeks and teach all the kids that they possibly can.

"The great thing about having a program like this is you not only have theoretical but also practical experience," said Troline. "With both combined it’s the best classroom we could provide to any child of any age.”