Making Trips to School Safer Across the City: A New Daylighting Program

Children help make their school zone safer by painting curbs red near crosswalks at a community event.

Yesterday, we launched our School Daylighting Program—a major step toward making school zones safer for children across San Francisco. This is our priority as we put California’s new ‘daylighting' law into action. The law makes it illegal to park within 20 feet of a crosswalk to improve visibility and reduce crashes.

We’re starting by painting curbs red near crosswalks that are within 600 feet of public schools. This work is about keeping our kids, educators and caregivers safe getting to and from school.

We kicked things off at New Traditions Elementary School, celebrating with the people who benefit most: students, families and caregivers. District 7 Supervisor and San Francisco County Transportation Authority (SFCTA) Chair Myrna Melgar, Walk SF, and members of the school community joined our director of streets, Viktoriya Wise, to officially launch the new program.

With help from our paint crews, students joined in painting the curbs red to celebrate making streets around schools safer. Clear corners make a big difference. That’s especially true during the rush of morning drop-offs and afternoon pick-ups—whether kids are walking, biking, taking transit or carpooling. 

Why we’re starting with schools 

School zones are some of the busiest areas at certain times of day—and they’re filled with kids.

Daylighting means keeping the area near a crosswalk clear of parked cars. It helps people driving see people trying to cross. People walking also find it easier to see oncoming vehicles. Daylighting is a proven, simple and low-cost safety measure.

Kids especially benefit. They’re shorter and often can’t see past a parked car—or be seen by people driving—when trying to cross the street. That’s why we’re starting by painting curbs red near school zones.

Our School Daylighting Program will make it easier for drivers to see children trying to cross the street. This is especially important during the morning rush and afternoon pick-up. 

District 7 Supervisor and SFCTA Chair Myrna Melgar and SFMTA Streets Director Viktoriya Wise join children to paint curbs red and celebrate the launch of the School Daylighting Program.

Quick action for safer streets

Our work daylighting school zones is the first step in a larger strategy to comply with the new state law.

This spring, we shared information about daylighting and what the new law requires. We also covered how we’re working to make enforcement clear and fair for people driving.

To streamline our rollout, we’re completing daylighting upgrades in three stages.  Our goal is to daylight every intersection in San Francisco by the end of 2026: 

• High Injury Network: These are the city’s most dangerous streets. Within the coming weeks, we will have painted red curbs to indicate daylighting at every intersection on the High Injury Network.
• School zones: Students and families are especially vulnerable. By the end of 2025, we will daylight all intersections within 600 feet of public schools across San Francisco.
• Citywide: Once school zones are complete, we will move on to the rest of San Francisco. The team will daylight all remaining intersections by the end of 2026. 

Work is already moving fast. Crews have completed half of all school locations, and we’re on track to finish the rest by the end of this year.

Our work daylighting curbs near school zones will make these areas safer for everyone.

Safer for everyone, every way you get around

While this program starts with schools, daylighting benefits everyone—no matter how you get around. Whether you're walking, biking, or driving, clearer intersections mean better visibility and fewer close calls.

This simple change helps create safer, calmer and more liveable neighborhoods for all of us—kids and adults, day and night.

Not new, just expanding

Daylighting isn’t new to San Francisco. We’ve already used this safety tool in busy areas and on the High Injury Network.

Now, with the new state law, we’re expanding it citywide.

Rules to remember 

• The new state law bans parking within 20 feet of the approach side of a marked or unmarked crosswalk.
• If you park at a curb within 20 feet of an intersection that is unmarked (gray), you won't get a fine. However, you might receive a zero-cost warning.
• Once the city paints a curb red, standard no-parking rules and fines will apply, as they do today

To learn more about daylighting in San Francisco, visit our Daylighting webpage (SFMTA.com/Daylighting) or email us with any questions about the program at daylighting@sfmta.com.