Outside IDEA Converse in East Bexar County, students are crossing one of the area's busiest state highways with no marked crosswalk and no pedestrian signage to guide them. Parents say the danger has grown worse as ongoing road construction squeezes FM 1516 down to a single lane in each direction, and some have resorted to parking blocks away at a gas station just to retrieve their kids safely.
The intersection of FM 1516 and Binz-Engleman Road sits right next to the charter school, according to KSAT, which first reported that the crossing has no marked crosswalk or pedestrian signage despite heavy foot and vehicle traffic. IDEA Converse students have been left to cross near the intersection only when traffic briefly clears, the station reported. Parent Latoya Bryant told the outlet that traffic is very heavy near the intersection, which is why she and other parents use a nearby Valero gas station for more maneuvering space when picking up their kids.
Construction Chokes the Corridor
The congestion isn't incidental. The Texas Department of Transportation is in the middle of a $68 million expansion of FM 1516, widening 4.6 miles of the corridor from FM 78 to I-10 from two lanes to four, complete with a continuous turn lane, sidewalks, and bike paths, according to TxDOT. That project isn't slated to wrap until fall 2028, and in the meantime, the reduced lane configuration has caused backups near the school's intersection, per the same KSAT report.
IDEA Converse opened in August 2020 at 5490 FM 1516 N and now includes two campuses, IDEA Converse Academy and IDEA Converse College Preparatory, serving more than 1,200 students in grades K through 10, according to IDEA Public Schools. The school provides no buses, meaning families have had to arrange their own drop-offs and pickups since it opened. That's not unusual for Texas charter schools: under Texas Education Code Chapter 34, open-enrollment charters and traditional districts alike are not legally required to provide bus transportation for general education students, according to the Texas Education Agency.
School Says It's Talking With the City
IDEA Public Schools currently supervises student departures with a crossing guard and school staff, per an official statement to KSAT. The district says it is aware of the safety concerns at IDEA Converse and takes them seriously, and it is communicating with the City of Converse about potential additional safety measures. Those measures under discussion reportedly include reduced speed limits, added signage, school-zone designations, additional crossing assistance near the traffic light, and permanent pedestrian crossing improvements.
Any of those changes will take time to materialize because FM 1516 is a state-maintained highway. Establishing or altering a school-zone speed limit on a road like it requires TxDOT to complete a formal engineering and traffic investigation before restrictions can be enacted, under Texas Transportation Code § 545.357, according to the Texas Municipal League. City councils can request annual public hearings with TxDOT to evaluate speed limits near schools, though that process runs on its own timeline separate from the roadway widening already underway.
State Funding Exists, But Requires a Local Push
There is a funding mechanism built for exactly this kind of hazard. Texas Administrative Code Title 19 § 61.1016 allows public charter schools and districts to apply for up to a 10% additional state transportation allotment to bus students living within two miles of campus if they face hazardous traffic conditions, such as crossing an uncontrolled major arterial. Accessing that money requires the school board to formally adopt a hazardous traffic policy first, a step that would give administrators and parents a concrete tool to push for temporary crossing guards or shuttle service while the roadway construction continues.
Part of a Wider Pattern in Northeast Bexar County
The crossing concerns at IDEA Converse come amid a string of severe crashes involving pedestrians and cyclists on nearby roads. Hoodline reported that a 46-year-old cyclist was hit and critically injured in a hit-and-run on FM 78 in Converse in August, in the same northeast Bexar County corridor where a pedestrian had been critically struck just weeks earlier, steps from a prior fatal hit-and-run.
The numbers back up the pattern. TxDOT recorded 6,095 pedestrian-involved crashes statewide in 2024, resulting in 772 deaths and 1,455 serious injuries, with pedestrians accounting for 19% of all Texas roadway fatalities despite making up just 1% of total traffic crashes. Bexar County alone logged 190 traffic fatalities in 2025, the fourth-highest total among Texas counties behind Harris, Dallas, and Tarrant. Across the eight-county San Antonio metro area, pedestrian-involved crashes have topped 1,000 annually, with Bexar County accounting for roughly 93% of those incidents.
Suburban growth has only added to the traffic funneling through the area. Infrastructure projects in Converse have focused on connecting residential subdivisions to FM 1516 via Binz-Engleman Road, which serves as a major connector between Loop 1604 and FM 1516 near several school campuses, according to a report from MySA. That growth, paired with a multi-year highway widening project and a school with no bus service, has left families near IDEA Converse navigating the gap on their own for now, while IDEA Public Schools and the City of Converse continue their discussions over what comes next.
