Students in the North Allegheny School District should have a safer experience when waiting for the bus or walking to school.
A grant of $134,415 from PennDOT’s Automated Red Light Enforcement program was awarded to McCandless for replacing faded school crossing signage, installing rectangular rapid flashing beacons and upgrading all school zone flashing signals located within the town.
“This grant was originated and pursued by the town in order to promote safety in all of our school crossing zones. New and modernized equipment will help to ensure that the students and their families are safe as they walk to school or get dropped off close by,” said John Schwend, manager of McCandless.
State Rep. Arvind Venkat, D-McCandless, along with state Sen. Lindsey Williams, D-West View, also collaborated with the town to obtain the grant, according to Walker Kmetz, media speaker for the House Democratic Caucus.
Signage and rectangular rapid flashing beacons will be installed, and all North Allegheny schools located in McCandless will receive the improvements. The flashing beacons have been proven to reduce crashes involving pedestrians and increase driver yield rates of up to 96%, according to the town’s engineers.
“This is a proactive measure taken to enhance safety. In addition, this project will provide the town the ability to change time of day operations for school zones remotely when school delays or scheduled days off occur, decreasing maintenance and operation costs,” Schwend said.
The primary purpose of ARLE Systems in Pennsylvania is to improve safety at signalized intersections by providing automated enforcement at locations where red light running has been an issue, according to PennDOT’s website.
ARLE is a tool to help improve safety at intersections by delivering an automated enforcement activity that would otherwise be done by a police officer, if enough resources were available.
Grant funding for the program came from red-light violations at intersections in Philadelphia. State law specifies that projects improving safety, enhancing mobility and reducing congestion can be considered for funding, according to a Feb. 10 announcement from Gov. Josh Shapiro’s office.
Projects were selected by an eight-member committee based on criteria such as safety benefits and effectiveness, cost, and local and regional impact, per the announcement.
Another local ARLE recipient was Pine, which received $355,574 to replace five-section left-turn signals with flashing yellow arrows and install updated controllers throughout the township, as well as replace mast arms at the intersections of Route 19 and Bradford Road, and Route 910 and Pearce Mill Road, according to a 2026 award list at penndot.gov.
McCandless also received $350,000 for a storm sewer lining project as part of the Small Water and Sewer Grants Program that replaces aging waterlines and updates water infrastructure. It was secured with the help of Venkat and Williams.