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SA neighbors getting crosswalk they pushed for

A lot of San Antonians have projects they'd like to see in their neighborhoods. One group of neighbors pulled together and worked with city leaders to make theirs happen.

SAN ANTONIO — A group of neighbors on the south side of San Antonio said they frequently faced danger when trying to cross a road near their homes, so they petitioned to get a crosswalk put into place.

Marlene Phillips said she and her neighbors crossed South Flores and Mayfield multiple times each day to get to the bus stop, post office and a store. But without a crosswalk nearby, each errand became an ordeal.

"When we crossed the street, we had to wait in the middle, in the street, and there's no median where we can stand," Phillips said. "It takes us sometimes 25 minutes just to stand in the middle, while cars are honking horns at us and they're speeding, going 60-70 miles per hour around us, so we really needed it."

They saw the danger become all too real for some of their neighbors. So in 2016, they banded together, working with Texas Organizing Project to learn how to work with the city to get bond money for the project.

"We walked the streets and got petitions to ask the residents here who lived in this area if we needed a crosswalk and how they felt, then we took the petitions to the council office for Ms. Viagran, and asked for a crosswalk, and it went on from there," Phillips said.

District 3 council member Rebecca Viagran worked with them to find $200,000 worth of bond money from the Pedestrian Mobility Fund to pay for the new crosswalk.

Transportation and Capital Improvements said it expects the project to be complete by April 2019.

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