Brookland, AR – (JonesboroRightNow.com) – Aug. 20, 2025 – Brookland Public Schools (BPS), along with city leaders, are working to make sure children are safe and traffic moves smoothly as the first month of the new school year continues.
Traffic issues within the school district have been an issue for over a decade, according to superintendent George Kennedy. While growth in students could be attributed to the problem, Kennedy said added buildings within the district is one of the main reasons.
“As they [BPS] grew, they built on the land that they owned already,” Kennedy said. “You start as a 2A, 3A-sized school, it doesn’t affect you as much, but they grew exponentially in size, built more buildings. There are more kids, more cars, all in that same area, it’s just one problem on top of another.”
A Facebook post explained that on Aug. 13, BPS officials had spoken with city leaders on the issue, including Brookland mayor Kenneth Jones and police chief Jon Moore. The Arkansas Department of Transportation was also involved in the discussions.
“It was just kind of a brainstorming session where we bounced different ideas off each other,” Moore said.
Some of the ideas discussed, according to Moore, included creating pick-up and drop-off points for school choice children, where a bus would pick them up offside and bring them onto the campus, and introducing staggered start times for schools.
“We can stagger our start time and get that line moving a little sooner or a little later depending on the building, so that the traffic will continue to deploy, because traffic is going to be there no matter what,” Kennedy said.
Jones explained typically around this time, the new traffic flow catches some drivers off-guard, leading to potential issues like crashes. Moore called it an “all hands on deck” situation for his department.
“We even have the night guys come in, and they work overtime to help with the volume of traffic in that first couple of weeks,” Moore said. “We’re usually outside of the cars, helping parents figure out where they need to go, basically directing traffic.”
However, according to Jones, the problem usually dies down within three weeks of the new school year.
“For 99 percent of the drivers, they’re very patient, considerate, but if you have one or two percent that say, ‘Well, I’m going now, it’s my turn, I don’t care,’ it causes issues, and that’s what we work through the first two or three weeks, and generally by the Labor Day weekend, it’s all settled,” Jones said.
The post advised drivers that residents of Hickory Street and Oak Street may need to back out of their driveways during times of high traffic, so they should be allowed to exit.
“They [drivers] have a tendency to block driveways and people trying to get in and out from their home, and that can cause an issue,” Jones said. “City streets are not a parking lot, and if you’re on the city street before 2:55 in the afternoon, you will be written a ticket.”
Kennedy said Brookland Primary School, which is located at 120 N. Hickory St., sees plenty of cars and children, which makes it difficult to control traffic during this time of the year.
“You’re talking about three, four, and five-year-olds that they’re getting out of the cars, they’ll unbuckle them, and help them get everything that they need to have. They’re not as independent, and I think that’s where the congestion happens,” Kennedy said.
Another idea being looked at is adding a road to the other side of the middle school. Kennedy explained that this would bring the elementary line around the middle school, so there is more room to get off Highway 49 and Hickory Street.
Kennedy said he would also love to hire additional staff to help with directing traffic, but he added that the school district does not have the resources to hire more people.
However, he added that he would love to get volunteers to help out, even suggesting that high school students could help since recent graduation requirements mandate students to have a certain number of community service hours.
While these ideas have been discussed, Kennedy emphasized that implementing them may take longer than residents think.
“It’s not as easy as saying, ‘We’re just going to do this.’ You have to have adults there and ready, and then you start looking at overtime for teachers and staff and all of that, and so there are a lot of moving parts to the equation that somebody on the outside doesn’t quite see,” he said.
Overall, Kennedy said the district wants do what is best for this situation: making sure traffic moves earlier and smoothly.
“It’s always going to take a while, especially if parents have to drop off in several different areas. Our effort is just to try to get that traffic flowing so that there’s not a backup, but it’s always going to take a while,” Kennedy said.
