Since the establishment of Camas High School (CHS), students have shared a common complaint: there’s too much traffic when leaving school. These issues have seemingly been plaguing the school for quite some time, but why exactly do they occur? CHS Students agree that regardless of the cause, there’s definitely an issue in the current system. 

“There’s a lot of people and not many ways to get out of the school. People don’t follow the parking lot rules and aren’t courteous to other drivers,” said CHS senior Paige Frawley.

“There are a lot of bad drivers [at CHS],” said CHS senior Tenkyong Namgyal.

Although some student complaints such as poor student driving skills won’t be fixed anytime soon, some students have raised valid points regarding the CHS parking lot’s structure.

“The road paths aren’t really made too well- too many turns and unnecessary winds that make it too complicated, and the roads are a little cramped too,” said Namgyal.

Many students have also provided advice on how the traffic problem could be remedied, focusing mainly on suggesting a reworking of some kind or the creation of a new parking lot-management system, though this would also likely propose changes to the student release schedule. 

“Maybe making a system that allows parking rows to join the exit street more effectively,” said CHS senior Paige Frawley.

“Reconstruction [would help] so it’s easier to get out,” said Namgyal. 

“[We should] excuse seniors at 2:45 [and] juniors and sophomores at 2:55,” said CHS senior Logan Garza.

While these suggestions could possibly provide some inspiration to the CHS administration, it is highly unlikely that any large construction or reconstruction would take place, especially considering the already lengthy list of changes to the schedule that administration has made in the past few years.

Any large change would likely only come if this traffic issue was deemed urgent enough to warrant that change. 

But just how urgent of an issue is this? 

Student opinion on this matter is mixed, with some students complimenting the administration for sufficient traffic management, while others remain upset with the state of after-school traffic at CHS.

“It sucks. people don’t know how to drive,” said CHS senior Marco Orlando.

“I think the school has done a much better job managing it this year… the main issue is just the lack of exits,” said CHS senior Paige Frawley. 

“Traffic is bad, but not the worst. It’s not too bad if I get out early enough, but if I wait too long, it can take about ten minutes just to get onto the actual road,” said Namgyal.

“Waiting in traffic is unbearable so I tend to wait inside or in my car until it clears to leave,” said CHS senior Logan Garza. 

Although many students express feelings of frustration toward the current traffic trends at CHS, a lack of realistic situations as well as a long history of little-to-no parking lot adjustments suggest that this issue may never be fixed. An unfortunate conclusion to be sure, but until CHS is not located on a country road and people become better drivers, it’s highly unlikely that traffic will improve by any significant margin.