San Francisco Supervisor Norman Yee helped educate young students about pedestrian safety at an interactive traffic simulation at a San Francisco school this morning.
Yee was joined by the San Francisco Fire Chief Joanne Hayes-White, Police Chief Greg Suhr, San Francisco Unified School District Superintendent Richard Carranza and other officials at Lakeshore Elementary School at 220 Middlefield Drive, where students played a pedestrian safety video game and were part of a life-sized street simulation.
Peggy Knudson, a surgeon at San Francisco General Hospital, developed the video game, Ace’s Adventure, to teach students about staying safe while walking across the street and on sidewalks.
The street simulation, called Richie’s Neighborhood, placed students in situations where they had to handle traffic signals, street lights, crosswalks, cars backing up from garages, and other types of events that are likely to occur when walking in a city.
Supervisor Yee secured funding to bring the demonstration up to San Francisco for two days from its home base in Southern California, where the colorful life-size simulated neighborhood is usually housed at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles.
The pedestrian safety education effort is part of the city’s “Vision Zero,” a 10-year goal to eliminate all traffic fatalities.
There have been seven pedestrian deaths in San Francisco so far this year.
Sasha Lekach, Bay City News
