Every sign, every time: Fifield Memorial Foundation strives to improve road safety
Brenda Ahearn photos/Daily Inter Lake A billboard featuring a photograph from the aftermath of Allison Fifield’s accident in 2005 was designed by Flathead High School senior Dakota Light-Smith. The Allison Fifield Memorial Foundation, started by Fifield’s parents after their daughter’s death caused by a dump truck driver on Stillwater Road that ran a stop sign and collided with her vehicle, is putting up billboards this summer to remind drivers to come to a complete stop at stop signs.
Flathead senior Ryan Liam-Salim, a student in Eric Hanson’s graphic design class, works on his billboard design in early May. The winning signs will be put up along U.S. 2 East and U.S. 93 South this summer.
Nearly every time he’s driving, Paul Fifield witnesses people breaking traffic laws.
They speed. They drive in the oncoming lane to get to a left-turn lane. They fail to use their turn signals.
“In town every day, people are violating every rule of the road,” he said.
The violation that hits closest to home with Fifield is failing to come to a complete stop at stop signs.
“That’s what got our daughter killed,” he said.
Fifield’s daughter, Allison, died when a dump-truck driver failed to stop at an intersection and slammed into Allison’s car.
After her death, her parents started a nonprofit organization in her name. The Allison Fifield Memorial Foundation has long wanted to be involved in improving safety on the roads, Fifield said.
That’s why this summer, the foundation will put up billboards reminding drivers to come to a complete stop at stop signs. The signs, which will go up on U.S. 2 East and U.S. 93 South, were designed by students in Flathead High School’s graphic arts class.
Fifield approached teacher Eric Hanson this spring about the project.
“Eric was tickled to get it,” Fifield said. “It was a chance to give kids a real-life scenario with real deadlines.”
It was the first time Hanson’s students had created billboards. The project required stretching the limits of what they’d learned up to that point, Hanson said.
“Definitely when you’re working on this scale, 10 feet tall by 22 feet wide, that size is a little bit different from anything we’ve done,” he said.
It was also the first time the students had experienced designing a project for a client, he added.
“They found out what it’s really like to design something for someone else ... rather than just being the sole person who gets to make all the decisions,” he said. “They were ... trying to satisfy the client’s needs and wants rather than deciding it all on their own.”
Fifield visited Hanson’s class this spring to explain the project and the sad story behind it.
Allison Fifield was killed in June 2005 when an 80,000-pound dump truck heading south on Stillwater Road ran the stop sign then in place at the West Reserve Drive intersection and collided with Allison’s car. After her death, her parents successfully lobbied the state Department of Transportation to turn the intersection into a four-way stop, and in 2007, the intersection became the Allison Fifield Memorial Roundabout.
The Fifields also formed the 501(c)3 nonprofit foundation after their daughter’s death. Paul Fifield serves as president; his wife, Marlene, is the treasurer. Family friend Bruce Erickson is the vice president, and Eliza Sorte, director of the Northwest Montana Educational Cooperative, is the secretary.
The foundation focuses mainly on scholarships for Flathead and Glacier high school graduates. This year, the group awarded $20,000 in scholarships to new high school graduates and current college students.
Marlene Fifield also is active in traffic education in schools throughout the valley, and foundation members have long talked about getting involved with Driver Safety Week in October, Fifield said. They may develop bumper stickers with the same slogan the students incorporated into their billboard designs: Every sign, every time.
Each student in Hanson’s Graphic Design 1 and Graphic Design 2 classes came up with a billboard that addressed that theme, Hanson said. Those designs then were given to Fifield.
“They had them all nicely done on foam core board, already in the aspect ratio billboards are. They were neatly and professionally done,” Fifield said. “We were overwhelmed when Eric gave us 14 different designs.”
The foundation members went through the designs one by one and narrowed their favorites to two.
One was a simple design created by senior Ryan Liem-Salim, a full-year graphic design student. The billboard says, “Do you stop every time?” and the “stop” is a stop sign.
“It’s very simple, minimalistic. It’s readable at a high rate of speed,” Hanson said. “It gets the point across and gets people thinking about stopping at stop signs.”
The other chosen design was created by another senior, Dakota Light-Smith, who also took graphic design for a full year. Her billboard used a photograph from the accident’s aftermath.
“How it was laid out, it was an effective image,” Hanson said.
Fifield said he was impressed with the billboards the students presented.
“I think the kids did a great job,” he said. “It was kind of fun to see them take the ball and run with it.”
The first two billboards — one of each design — are slated to go up July 5, he said. They will be on U.S. 2 East between Kalispell and Columbia Falls; one will face north and the other will face south.
Two more billboards will go up later this summer on U.S. 93 at Four Corners and will also face north and south, Fifield said. All the billboards will run for 12 weeks.
One billboard will be sponsored by Eisinger Motors. The foundation would welcome additional sponsorships. For further information, contact Fifield at 755-4172.
Reporter Kristi Albertson may be reached at 758-4438 or at kalbertson@dailyinterlake.com.