In the 2012-13 school year, Lake Braddock had only a couple of car accidents,but this low accident rate and overall relative safety of the school is probably due to safety precautions to ensure that accidents occur minimally. LB is known for being a safe place for students to learn and an environment suited for everybody.

“Not many [accidents occur],” safety and security specialist Ralph Gardner said. “About two to three a year.”

The accidents that occur are commonly in the parking lots after dismissal. For football games and other special events, traffic is much more congested than during the school day. Especially during homecoming, traffic is extremely congested. This leads to more traffic precautions, like cones being set up.

“We have traffic patterns set up, so if people follow them it will be OK,” Gardner said. “Drivers also tend to be more cautious.”

But the main problem doesn’t lay in the traffic, but rather, those in the traffic. Most accidents occur in the parking lot, especially when people aren’t paying attention while backing out of a parking space.

The back exits have remained closed in the mornings. In past years the exits were used by many parents as a student drop-off area, which it is not, contributing to accidents and other incidents

“[We closed the entrance] for the safety of the teachers,” Gardner said.

Teachers have also been in accidents in the school, however, in most of these incidents, the student was at fault. Such an incident happened to P.E teacher Joe Soos/

The majority of students agreed that extra police officers around the school would help with the general traffic flow.

An obvious solution for these traffic problems does exist: take the bus.

“There’s so much traffic because parents drop off their kids instead of letting them take the school bus,”  Soos said. “And when you take in the volume of the traffic, the number of parking spots, it’s just not enough, people should really let their kids ride the school bus.”

FCPS is in charge of the largest bus fleet of any U.S. public school system. The bus is notoriously known as the least favorable option for students to get to school or go home.