Berry accident makes six

JOHNNY MULLIGAN

Dating back to 2013, six accidents occurred on Berry Street within the vicinity of the Roseville High School campus. Three of the accidents were property damage only, two were injury collisions and one was a DUI collision.

Since 2015, 15 traffic stops were made and 11 citations issued which included three parking violations. Roseville High School principal David Byrd is aware that Berry Street can be dangerous for cars and pedestrians.

He also believes distracted driving and speeding are a major problem, especially with teenagers and new drivers on the road.

“You can build all the overpasses, underpasses, get crossing guards, lights and all that stuff but the reality is you gotta slow down,” Byrd said. “Everybody’s gotta pay attention and realize this environment at certain times of the day has a ton of people in it.”

Senior Zoe Stephens was involved in a collision while her friend was driving in early April, in which another driver made an illegal U-turn without seeing their car and hit them.

“Basically nobody really follows any rules on Berry Street. It’s just kind of anarchy,” Stephens said. “The woman just did a U-turn directly in front of the no U-turn sign and slammed into us.”

Stephens believes that the rules in place, as long as drivers adhere to them, are sufficient to solve the issues on Berry Street, but said that better parking would help to alleviate many of these problems as well.

“I really think that if there was better parking, there wouldn’t be such a huge problem,” Stephens said. “The reason we were there in the first place was because there was no parking [in the] Berry Lot. But if there was parking, it wouldn’t be so crowded and it would be functioning a lot better.”