Dear Town of Ludlow,

My name is Paul, I've been a Ludlow resident all my life and graduated LHS in 2004. I am now raising two daughters here and my oldest started Kindergarten at East St School this year.  I have three observations I would like to share regarding the grounds and request the town's assistance.

First, the crosswalk on East St leading to the school, the one on the right if you are facing the front of the building, is badly buckled on the beginning and ending of the sidewalk.  A wheelchair would be incapable of scaling the buckled pavement.  I take my younger daughter to the school in a stroller to pick up my other and i have a lot of difficulty with that crosswalk (the only walk with a crossing guard posted), I have been stuck trying to scale the pavement by doing a "wheelie" with the stroller to get above the buckling.  I should not need to be exposed in  the street with an 8 month old baby in a stroller because the crosswalk is damaged.

Second, the snow and ice removal on the property has been lacking, and I don't mean immediately after a storm, I'm talking days after the snow or ice has arrived.  To pick up your child, you have to walk around the left side (facing the front entrance) of the building.  Again, I use a stroller for my younger daughter when I'm picking up my older and the snow, slush, and ice on  those sidewalks has been impossible to traverse on wheels.  I imagine this also makes the sidewalks inaccessible to handicapped individuals in wheelchairs.  When you approach the building and pick up area, I have found on several occasions that area is covered in ice is all over the parking area we gather to pick up our children.  The side street is packed with other parent's cars so avoiding the sidewalks by walking on the double parked side street is dangerous and we shouldn't have to resort to that.  I respectfully request snow and ice be removed from:
-The entrances and exits of the crosswalks in front of the school as plows build barriers as they push the snow off the street and clog these ways with inches or foot high piles of snow.
-The left side of the building including the sidewalks and parking area (there is an often used handicap space there as well)

Third, I drop my child off in the morning from my car in a sort of valet service the school provides.  This always goes smoothly and I appreciate they offer this especially because I have my 8mo old with me and allowing her to stay in her car seat is wonderful.  The problem is the exit coming out back to East st from the right side of the school )if facing the building).  Cars exit on a one way on to East St from the school in two lanes, one going left and one going right.  Taking a left onto East St from this exit is dangerous.  When you pull up to the intersection, parked cars block your vision of oncoming traffic to your left and the cars taking a right block your vision to the right.  There is a crossing guard posted there that sometimes offers safe passage but only because he stops traffic to the right of the exit however most of the time, the stopped cars block your way out waiting at the crosswalk instead of allowing people to take that left.  To make things more dangerous, I highly doubt people are observing the school zone speed limit of 20mph.  I have seen an officer there on a few occasions but in plain sight.  People are going to behave when they can see a police cruiser.  My proposed solution is having someone qualified to direct traffic station that intersection from 8:30 AM to 8:55 AM, just 25 minutes every weekday to keep traffic flowing and and most importantly provide safety to exiting vehicles.

Town officials, thank you for keeping our wonderful town wonderful!  I only hope this sheds some light on problems that can be solved.

Sincerely,
Paul, father of two