Study suggests safety improvements needed where boy killed on Landstar Boulevard

ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. — Orange County officials are now looking at making another school area safer for kids to walk to school.

Last month, a crash on Landstar Boulevard near northbound State Road 417 killed a 6-year-old boy who was on his way to Meadow Woods Elementary School.

The driver of the tractor-trailer involved in the crash said he didn't see Jaden Vallejo crossing Landstar Boulevard, and the county wants to prevent similar accidents from happening.

A white bike sits as a memorial at the crash site, serving as reminder that need to share the road with bicyclists and pedestrians.

February's deadly crash was also a wake-up call to the county and the Orlando-Orange County Expressway Authority that they needed to take a second look at the area to see if safety improvements were needed.

Channel 9 found results of a study showed the area should be designated a school crossing zone because of the amount of kids who walk to the elementary and middle schools nearby.

The designation would mean replacing signs and adding even more in the area to warn drivers.

"The school crossing signs would have an advance sign about 300-400 feet in advance and that would give enough motorists advance notice that there would be a crossing ahead," said school safety coordinator Kevin Miller.

The advance signs would have warned the truck driver that day that a crosswalk was coming up.

Plans also call for new crosswalk buttons and an additional traffic signal so drivers are forced to stop instead of being allowed to yield at the same crosswalk where Vallejo was hit.

"The area has changed and we need to keep up with the changes," said Miller.

The county didn't have a timeline on when all the safety improvements would be made and all of the signs replaced but they said they're meeting with the Expressway Authority next week to finalize plans.

WFTV