“Students have more than muggings to worry about when walking on Exchange Street. Jaywalking is a minor misdemeanor in which a pedestrian crosses the street without regard to traffic rules, such as crossing outside of a crosswalk. Crossing outside of the crosswalk can be seen on a regular basis on Exchange Street near the University of Akron’s residence facilities near Grant Street.”
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Students have more than muggings to worry about when walking on Exchange Street.

Jaywalking is a minor misdemeanor in which a pedestrian crosses the street without regard to traffic rules, such as crossing outside of a crosswalk.

Crossing outside of the crosswalk can be seen on a regular basis on Exchange Street near the University of Akron’s residence facilities near Grant Street.

Recently, police have begun to deter students from jaywalking.

Scott Seibert, a junior who lives in a university townhouse, said UAPD police officers were out warning students last week for illegally crossing Exchange Street.

According to Seibert, the officers were using megaphones to warn students to stop jaywalking and occasionally stopping some and issuing written warnings.

The new Exchange Street dorm has created a real traffic concern, said Daniel Zampelli of the Akron Police Department. We need to address the issue of traffic control.

Zampelli said officers are going after jay-walkers until students attitudes’ change.

In the future, there may be a traffic patrol officer but until then the way to address traffic control is to change the behavior of the students, he said. That’s why the officers are cracking down now.

However, many UA students do not see anything wrong with jaywalking and do not believe their behaviors need to change.

They are just giving the college students and everyone else that needs to cross in a hurry more problems, junior Crystal Slayton said.

The issue of getting to classes on time seems to be a big concern for students and jaywalking can be a quicker way to cross the street.

I think it’s a harmless offense, sophomore Mitchell Parry said. Students are just trying to get to class.

The UAPD and APD find the intersections on Exchange Street near campus to be dangerous not only for the pedestrians crossing the street but for oncoming traffic as well.

If students don’t find jaywalking a major offense, imagine getting a ticket for crossing the road illegally.

I don’t think it’s necessary, Parry said. The city needs to find other ways to prevent the problem, like putting in adequate crosswalks with walking signals.

Dan Williams, a sophomore, agrees.

I think that it is a joke to cite students for jaywalking, he said. There are more important things for the police to be looking out for recently on campus.

Newt Engle, a UAPD captain, agrees with Williams and said jaywalking is not on top of his list of worries.

We’re not going out looking for jay-walkers, Engle said. But if we get caught up on calls, we’ll sometimes sit out by Buckingham or Exchange.

According to Engle, there are a lot of students running across the intersections on Exchange Street, and officers were requested to sit there and watch for jay-walkers.

Engle said jaywalking is a minor misdemeanor noted as a traffic violation, the cost of which is about the same as a traffic ticket.

However, will issuing tickets to students stop jaywalking?

I don’t think this is going to affect me, Slayton said. If I’m in a hurry to class and I need to cross the street, then I’m going to cross the street regardless of what the cops are doing.

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” #1.1361470:1576164194.jpg:20071127_jaywalking_cb.jpg:Students crossing Exchange to get to the Exchange Street residence hall often cut through traffic.:Chistopher Bair”