There is concern about parking, drop off and unloading zone traffic congestion around Westwood and Franklin Elementary Schools, but the Planning Board in Junction City is still recommending approval on site plans for proposed expansion of those schools.

As part of their recommendation for approval the Board, meeting in special session Friday at the Municipal Building,  included a requirement that there be no increase in staffing at the schools  since that could tie in to the traffic congestion issues. The recommendation goes to the Junction City Commission for consideration.

But the Planning Board’s concern about the parking will also be included in the report to the City. Board member Mike Watson said he saw no waste of money with the proposed projects, but pointed to the parking and traffic congestion at the two school sites. “Storm shelters, and if you’ve got nine classes sharing two classrooms, I’ve seen that. They just put partitions and you can hear each other, and it’s really disruptive.” But he also added, “It looks like it’s the right stuff, but the truth of the matter is they really need to do these other things. And if we do that I think we need to put in there that they really need to take a hard look at that ( parking and congestion issues ) because we have some concerns, and we’re really afraid it sets up a situation for problems.

The Junction City Commission gets the recommendation from the MPC on June 2.