CHP Honors Lana Carlos with Safety Checkpoints
Drivers can expect a law enforcement presence outside of the 12 campuses around town. Pedestrians and bicyclists will also be guided to make smart decisions. In addition to badged officers, the CHP will have its senior volunteers driving around to ensure people obey the traffic laws.
Lana Carlos
This coming Monday, February 24, marks the fifth year since 12-year-old Lana Carlos was struck and killed crossing Crow Canyon Road. In her honor, the California Highway Patrol will be in force that morning, bringing attention to pedestrian safety around Castro Valley schools.
Drivers can expect a law enforcement presence outside of the 12 campuses around town. Pedestrians and bicyclists will also be guided to make smart decisions. In addition to badged officers, the CHP will have its senior volunteers driving around to ensure people obey the traffic laws.
“They don’t necessarily make traffic stops, but they’re there to write down license plates when they see drivers behaving badly,” CHP Officer Jennifer Pabst told the Forum. “We will also have marked units of patrol vehicles and motorcycles going through the school zones, ensuring that drivers are obeying the laws.”
Additionally, the CHP will be staging a random pedestrian operation somewhere in town. This is where a CHP volunteer wears visibly bright clothing and crosses at a crosswalk without a light or a stop sign. Drivers are expected to stop before coming to the crosswalk. Those who don’t should expect to get a moving citation and a reminder to share the road.
While CHP pedestrian enforcement and school zone safety days are often held in the fall, the idea of tying it to Lana Carlos’s death came after a tree-planting event at the Castro Valley Library last year.
“They were planting a tree in Lana’s memory, and my captain was inspired to do something in her memory and to bring awareness to pedestrian safety and school zone safety, so we decided the five-year anniversary would be a good day,” Officer Pabst said.
Carlos, a Creekside student, was walking with the signal in the crosswalk with her sister when a Ford F150 turned left from Manter Road onto Crow Canyon Road and hit and killed Lana. The incident set off a wave of measures to help protect pedestrians in the area.
When the CHP reached out to the Carlos family, Officer Pabst said Lana’s father, Les, was grateful that the CHP would go out and make sure that other children were safe. He has been invited to address CHP officers and Castro Valley Unified School District officials that morning.
“We feel that the work that everyone is doing in memory of Lana is valuable very valuable… she may be gone but her legacy and promoting and enforcing pedestrian and road safety will live on,” Les Carlos said.
The exchange was mutually emotional between the family and the CHP staff.
“I had tears in my eyes just because I have two boys where he had two daughters, and he said that his heart is just still broken with the with her passing,” Officer Pabst said. “Now he only has one daughter, which he's supposed to have two. I also related to that because I couldn't imagine only having one boy after something so tragic happened.”
With more people out walking – to get to work, school, and shopping or just for fun, exercise, and being outside – there is an increasing responsibility to ensure pedestrian safety remains a high priority.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) offers the following tips for drivers:
Look out for pedestrians everywhere, at all times.
Use extra caution when driving in hard-to-see conditions, such as nighttime or bad weather.
Slow down and be prepared to stop when turning or entering a crosswalk.
Yield to pedestrians in crosswalks and stop well back from the crosswalk to allow other vehicles to see the crossing pedestrians so they can stop, too.