Walk for safety: Grosse Pointe families cross Jefferson in protest of possible school closure

GROSSE POINTE PARK, Mich. (FOX 2) - Declining enrollment has Grosse Pointe schools looking into possible school closures. 

One on the docket is Trombly Elementary School, which has many parents concerned about the future safety of their kids if the school does in fact close. 

If Trombly closes, it would reroute the walk of hundreds of students across the very busy Jefferson Avenue, and during the morning rush hour no less.  

Parents and students gathered Friday morning at Windmill Pointe Park for a walk for safety rally. The group walked across Jefferson Avenue and back during rush hour, in hopes of bringing attention to city officials of the dangers of forcing young children to make the walk in the future. 

"We are feeling as though the [schools] on the borders are the ones that are kind of being squeezed out," parent Renee Jakubowski told us, "and a lot of people forget there's a subdivision over here, a neighborhood over here. It's a neighborhood with an elementary school that was built in 1926. It's a historic building and it is kind of isolated because of Jefferson being the main thoroughfare for everybody to get downtown for work in the morning. 

It also is an attractive point for young families entering Grosse Pointe because there is more affordable housing; there's some economic diversity here that really attracts people. We feel those things are being overlooked and so are our concerns about actually having 250 kindergartners through fifth graders crossing Jefferson, with no real plan in place."

A decision has to be made by the end of June which schools, if any, will be closed in the district.