Our project aim is to raise awareness of drivers about the right places to park the cars to pick up the students. Because they park the vans and cars in the wrong places, like disabled people's vacancy, or they stop in the middle of the street.
The ideas
After observing the recklessness of some drivers in the street in front of Colégio SESI in Pato Branco, where we saw many drivers parking their cars or vans in the disabled people's vacancy, some of them driving in high speed, and others stopping their cars in the middle of the street to wait for the students, we decided to raise awareness of drivers about where they should park their cars to wait for them. We want that the drivers understand that the crosswalk is not a place to stop cars and that the disabled people's vacancy has to be respected. At last, we did an interview with Paulo Ricardo Moraes, who works to DETRAN/PR (Traffic Department), to understand how one of their projects (Maio Amarelo/ Yellow May) works. He explained how the traffic in front of our school worked and where should be the places where cars and vans should park properly. Besides, he talked about the project Maio Amarelo that aims to raise awareness of drivers about high speed, the importance of driving safely and of not drinking before doing it. Having all these information we elaborated an article to send to a newspaper from our city with the aim to make people understand that everyone has its place and that the laws are made to be respected.
The initiatives
To accomplish our project, we decided to use a manikin that, in front of the disabled people's vacancy, hold a sign that said: "I don't board in here", to raise awareness of people that this place is not to park and wait for students but a place for people with disabilities to park. In addition to that we used a wheelchair that was "parked" in a regular parking place and the person was holding a sign that said: " It's just a minute!" so that we could reverse the roles. We talked to some people who were passing by and they told us that they thought this action was very important, they said that sometimes people get distracted and don't see the signs or they are in a hurry and really think it's not a big deal to park in a vacancy that is not for them, but they said it is nice to know that students are concerned about people with disabilities. This project was so special for us, we felt good doing this because we could help people, even for a little while, with something that really matters to them. It was nice to see that people sometimes can see their mistakes and change things to try to be better people. Maybe next time, when they park, they stop and think "Is this my place?"
