James Island resident calls out lack of crosswalk signs on Fort Johnson Road

JAMES ISLAND, S.C. (WCSC) - A James Island resident claims an area on Fort Johnson Road is lacking crosswalk signs in his neighborhood.

Gabe Macaluso has lived on James Island for almost four years and says he loves the area. His family calls James Island “The Sandlot” because of how welcoming the neighborhood is for children and families. Macaluso says most people know each other and look out for one another in the community.

Macaluso lives less than a mile from Stiles Point Elementary. When his son entered the third grade, he asked if he could start riding his bike to school. Encouragingly, Macaluso wanted his son to continue to grow and become active. While walking around the neighborhood and being by his son’s side as he biked to school, Macaluso noticed the lack of crosswalk signage in the area. On Fort Johnson Road at Tallwood and Joe Rivers, Macaluso says the crosswalk signs only face one direction and cars frequently drive right through when pedestrians are waiting to cross. He even says in October 2022, he notified the South Carolina Department of Transportation of the issue.  Unfortunately, he says that was two years ago and the signs still have not been placed correctly.

“We don’t always blame the cars for blowing through the crosswalk signs because there is no crosswalk sign facing them,” Macaluso says. “And the two streets are close but they’re probably two or three blocks away, so I don’t know if the Department of Transportation just figured ‘Oh we’ll put one crosswalk on this end and one crosswalk at this gap, it’ll cover it.’”

Macaluso says despite this, he does see the state recognizes the need for people to be mobile on the island with flashing lights and signs indicating crosswalks for pedestrians so vehicles approaching can slow down.

“You know we have a new James Island Mayor and I think it would be awesome if we had a public art project for crosswalk paintings,” Macaluso says. “Just something to draw attention to it. We do live in a time where people are distracted and people are always in a rush to go somewhere.”

SCDOT Communications Coordinator Kelly Moore said they are working on some fixes in the area.

“We did pass along this information along to the local office so that the traffic and maintenance teams can work together and address the missing sign and pavement markings,” Moore said. “Typically those issues are addressed in 30-60 days.”

If you have a road that driving you crazy, you can submit your concern to Live 5 News.