Parents and the Heights Task Force have been concerned about students walking on Barrett Road to and from Medicine Crow Middle School, since it opened in 2016.
At the beginning of this school year, more sidewalk was just completed to go along with what School District 2 had already built.
The Barrett Road Patio Home Apartments are in the Billings city limits, so the developer needed to put sidewalk down in front of that sub-division.
Another piece of property, owned by another developer, is not required to put down sidewalk, since it is outside the city limits.
But the buider of the Patio Home Apartments decided to construct it there anyway for the safety of the kids.
Students walk home from Medicine Crow Middle School, and now have a half mile sidewalk on Barrett Road from Bench Boulevard to Hawthorne Lane.
"I didn't really start walking here when there was no sidewalk yet," one student said.
"We're always concerned with our students getting here and getting home," said Michael Thomas, Medicine Crow principal. "Some of the most unsafe situations that we address every single day is kids around cars."
Students who go home in a different direction like the new sidewalk for their fellow schoolmates.
"It's useful for the kids who have to go straight because I don't think they should bike in the road," said Shaylie Robbins, a student at Medicine Crow.
"It was pretty bad," J.J. Robinson, Medicine Crow student, said about Barrett before the new sidewalk. "I don't go out that way. but thought it was pretty bad."
"No shoulder on that road, typical county road," said Jim Berve, general manager of ABCO Billings, the company that installed the sidewalk.
The city required sidewalk in front of the Barrett Road Patio Apartments and Berve's boss, Cal Kunkel, decided to build the sidewalk all the way up to Hawthorne.
"The request was made to carry it on and Cal agreed," Berve said.
"That's excellent because some of our students do walk quite far," Thomas said.
"There was nobody calling him saying hey, are you going to do those sidewalks? Nothing," said Jason Lillie, former chair of the Heights Task Force. "And he did it because he said he would."
Lillie said when there was confusion with zoning, Kunkel committed to putting in sidewalks five years ago.
"Parents were actually posting pictures of kids walking in the street with snow and ice and car traffic," Lillie said. "And so there was a lot of concern."
Now with another quarter mile of sidewalk added to the school district sidewalk, it's better for everyone.
"Me and my dog walk twice a day on the sidewalk," said Traci Briske, Heights resident. "And you can go all the way down (to Hawthorne) and all the way down (to Bench)."
"Having a sidewalk is pretty important for for the kids," said Ben Fuller, a Heights resident, who likes the sidewalks for his and other children.
"To have a member of our community step up and ensure that the most heavily trafficked portion of that road has sidewalks and safe access for children is huge," Lillie said.
