Despite an increase in the number of auto accidents on campus, officials and students say the McKinley Safety Improvement Project has made the street safer for drivers.
According to police records, auto accidents have increased from 10 years ago.
In 1998 the Ball State University Police Department had 13 reported auto accidents on campus, one of them on the section of McKinley Avenue that would be renovated. This year UPD has had 62 reported accidents, nine of them on the renovated section of McKinley.
Gene Burton, director of public safety, said he couldn't comment on the statistics without looking into them. Several factors could contribute to the increase such as increased enrollment, a higher percentage of students with cars or increased traffic through campus.
Jim Lowe, director of engineering and operations, said when designing the roads the main safety idea was to reduce stressful situations that could make drivers impatient.
"When they become impatient," Lowe said, "you just don't know what a driver would do."
Drivers could become stressed when waiting for traffic at stop lights or having to wait when other drivers stop their cars to let out passengers, he said.
The narrow width of McKinley's lanes was meant to slow drivers down to the speed limit or lower. Before the renovation, drivers sped through campus without realizing how fast they were going, he said. Now if drivers speed up, they will feel uncomfortable and slow down, Lowe said.
Driving slow improves reaction time, he said, and decreases the chance of hitting another car or a crossing pedestrian.
Lowe said another, smaller advantage of driving slowly and calmly was being able to see the university.
"Why speed through and miss our beautiful campus?" he said.
Alyssa Miller, junior elementary education major, said she never had a problem driving through campus and the renovation did slow down traffic.
She said she drove slower on McKinley and was stopped by bike and pedestrian traffic a few times, but it wasn't a big deal. The median helped with pedestrians crossing the street, she said.
"With only having to cross one lane, people are going to be less likely to walk out in front of you," she said.
Lowe said Ball State added pullover areas on each side of the median for buses and cars to pick up passengers in order to cut down on traffic backups due to drivers letting out passengers.
Lighting on McKinley improved since the remodeling, he said. More streetlights line the sidewalks and the medians were equipped with lights by the curbs. Drivers have an easier time seeing the road and when pedestrians need to cross, he said.
The intersection where Petty Road and Avenue meet at McKinley was hectic before the renovation expanded its lanes near the intersection, Lowe said.
Before the renovation, traffic would back up because the cars turning either direction or going straight had to share one lane, he said. That created a stressful situation in which drivers might have had to wait through two cycles of the stop light before proceeding. Now each side has a left-turn lane which gets traffic past the intersection quicker, he said.
Burton said the best things drivers can do to stay safe is to be aware of the surroundings, including pedestrians and other vehicles.
Senior psychology major Laura Elliot agreed.
She said she didn't think Ball State could do anything to improve drivers' safety, but drivers could be more aware.
"Instead of doing 100 things at once," she said, "don't multitask ... like I wait to leave the general campus area to get on my phone."
Elliot said she had a few experiences while driving on McKinley that made her feel unsafe, but McKinley was safer after the renovation.
She said she has been behind people who stop suddenly to let out a passenger and had to stop to avoid hitting a crossing pedestrian.
"I'm more afraid of hitting somebody than anything else," she said, "but I'm not scared to drive down there either."
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