People driving through the intersection of Old Red Trail and Sunset Drive today might think the intersection needs a stop light.

Officials with the North Dakota Department of Transportation already had the thought and sent a letter to the city. Acopy also reached the Mandan School District.

It will require some reshuffling of city projects to free up some funding before a stop light can be installed. It will cost about $600,000, said Mandan Superintendent Wilfred Volesky. The Mandan School District will pay a portion of the project. The state will pay 80 percent and the remainder will be split evenly among the school district and city.

In the meantime, to help traffic flow to the new Mandan Middle School, which begins classes today, the district had traffic markings painted on the roadway.

"This year, we painted lines so they get used to it before the snow flies," Volesky said.

It could be fall 2009 before the light is up. The city wants to have it bid in February, according to an e-mail from City Administrator Jim Neubauer to Volesky.

The middle school has a separate area for parents to drop off students from the place where buses will drop off students. The parent drop off is along the southern side of the school, near the main entrance, and the bus drop off is along the western side of the school.

Busing also begins the first day of school for Mandan Public School students. The new middle school and the Great Plains Sixth Grade Academy, which is in the old junior high, caused changes to the bus routes.

The district is busing all sixth-graders for the first time. The plan is to get the district's sixth-graders to the Great Plains Sixth-Grade Academy and the new Mandan Middle School uses many of the elementary schools as pick-up points, and a few buses doing double runs in the morning.

(Reach reporter Sara Kincaid at 250-8251 or sara.kincaid@bismarcktribune.com.)