ATTLEBORO — A plan to ban parking on one side of Harvard Street to prevent residents from obstructing the flow of traffic headed to Bishop Feehan High School has been put on the back burner.
Councilor Walter Thibodeau, who proposed the measure in August to head off protests from residents opposed to students and teachers using the Harvard entrance for the first time since the school opened in 1962, said the residents are not causing any problems.
He said he may have over-reacted to the potential for trouble, which did occur during a previous attempt to open the road more than a decade ago.
“Perhaps I was being too proactive,” he told colleagues.
He decided to hold the matter in his transportation and traffic committee indefinitely.
Efforts to use the road as a second access to Feehan has been a source of conflict between residents and the school for years.
Feehan announced last year it intended to make use of the road full time to enhance student safety and alleviate traffic congestion and later amended the plan to use it only school days and for limited hours.
Thibodeau spearheaded a move to hammer out a compromise that went into effect in September, despite residents’ arguments that their safety was at risk under the plan.
The plan seems to be working, although traffic gets very heavy from about 7 a.m. to 7:30 a.m. when as many as 300 cars stream up Harvard.
The school’s main access is on Holcott Drive.
GEORGE W. RHODES can be reached at 508-236-0432, at [email protected] and on Twitter @SCAttleboro.
