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Making an intersection unsafe for pedestrians to save seconds for drivers
- bedobi 2y agoThis is a solved problem and it's astonishing the world hasn't just adopted the Dutch traffic engineering standards outright. It's FASTER for cars and safer for people.
- ajmurmann 2y agoThe lack of adoption of best practices from other countries is generally baffling to me. When I first visited China grim Europe and saw traffic lights with countdowns (like in the US) I thought we did immediately adopt this in Europe. Cultural inertia and lack of looking outwards is really frustrating.
- CalRobert 2y agoA countdown on a traffic signal seems like a fun way to encourage drag racing. Though it's nice on pedestrian signals.
- HPsquared 2y agoAnother example of "this is why we can't have nice things".
- gpm 2y agoCrazy idea that would be next to politically impossible in North America: Have every traffic light with a countdown also be a speed camera. It'd eliminate the incentive to drag race, would give drivers more information earlier allowing better driving, and would generally make speeds limits actually a limit on roads with traffic lights.
- s1artibartfast 2y agoFirst you have to deal with the issue of cities selling camera data to third parties and using it for license plate tracking and face ID
- gpm 2y agoThat's a solved problem in responsible cities, say New York. The cameras only take a picture if they see someone speeding [1], and once they see someone speeding a citation is issued and that's a matter of public record [2] so there is no data to sell. But like I said, politically impossible, there's a very strong constituency and lobby of people who like cars and like speeding and will come up with excuses for why it couldn't work. For instance New York State restricts New York City to only putting speed cameras in school zones because of that group of people. [1] https://www.nyc.gov/html/dot/downloads/pdf/speed-camera-faq.pdf https://www.nyc.gov/html/dot/downloads/pdf/speed-camera-faq.... [2] https://data.cityofnewyork.us/City-Government/Open-Parking-and-Camera-Violations/nc67-uf89/data_preview https://data.cityofnewyork.us/City-Government/Open-Parking-a...
- RandomBacon 2y agoIs it a countdown until it turns green, or a countdown until it turns red? I think it's unlikely the latter would encourage drag racing.
- ajmurmann 2y agoI'd like to see both so that I can avoid coming to a full stop when it's red and on the other side of it avoid having to slam on the breaks.
- amalcon 2y agoThe driver can usually see the countdown on the pedestrian signal anyway. It's not obvious that this would be worse.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- Kuinox 2y agoHow are countdown signal better ?
- ajmurmann 2y agoI know if I still have time to try to cross or not. Especially on wider roads it's nice not to have to worry about being in the middle when it goes red.
- Tarq0n 2y agoResearch on countdown traffic lights is inconclusive with regards to their safety [0]. They can not realistically be described as best practice. [0] https://www.maxapress.com/data/article/dts/preview/pdf/DTS-2023-0016.pdf https://www.maxapress.com/data/article/dts/preview/pdf/DTS-2...
- iggldiggl 2y agoCountdown signals don't work with adaptive signalling where phases are dynamically lengthened or shortened (or sometimes entirely skipped) in response to traffic flows. They especially don't work with public transport priority.
- sjg1729 2y agoWhich standards are you referring to?
- Ensorceled 2y agoThey are literally referring to the "Dutch traffic engineering standards" when they say "Dutch traffic engineering standards"
- numerobis 2y agoWhat standards specifically? What is the solution to the problem that Dutch standards provide? Duh
- bb86754 2y agoIt’s an entire book length of material, but in short, for built up areas drivers are forced through street to design to be higher alert to their surroundings. EX: chicanes in the road, speed tables, brick roads, narrow streets, small/tight turn radius, no turn on red, etc. These all work together to make a system that is amongst the safest in the world for pedestrians, and by happenstance has the happiest drivers. Also, bike traffic and vehicle through traffic are separated on different networks, so a conflicts are minimized.
- Ensorceled 2y agoWhich requires a long and detailed answer that can be found by simply googling "Dutch traffic engineering standards" which leads you to an entire wealth of information.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- masklinn 2y agohttps://swov.nl/en/fact-sheet/principles-safe-road-network https://swov.nl/en/fact-sheet/principles-safe-road-network (national institute for road safety research) https://crowplatform.com/product/design-manual-for-bicycle-traffic/ https://crowplatform.com/product/design-manual-for-bicycle-t... (non-profit advisor to the ministry of transport)
- Salgat 2y agoTo clarify, aren't these standards mostly relevant where heavy bicycle traffic exists? Do they still apply in areas with little to no bicycle traffic? I'm assuming you're mostly referring to this famous manual: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CROW_Design_Manual_for_Bicycle_Traffic https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CROW_Design_Manual_for_Bicycle...
- andrepd 2y agoThere is no bicycle traffic because there are no bicycle roads. It's incorrect to claim that we shouldn't build bicycle roads because there's no bicycle traffic :)
- ndsipa_pomu 2y agoA similar concept would be to only build airports where there's lots of planes landing.
- estebank 2y agoOr arguing that a bridge shouldn't be built because people don't regularly swim across.
- kjkjadksj 2y agoThe hard problem isn’t figuring out what to do. Its to get people on board with shifting from a like for like infrastructure development model where the roads and built environment look more or less the same for decades, to a potential status quo changing model of infrastructure development. If you can solve that fundamental issue, traffic is just a footnote of the long list of problems you also solve on our planet.
- gjvc 2y agoIt never ceases to amaze me how many (fatal or serious) accidents (of all types in all circumstances) occur due to wanting to save seconds -- not minutes, hours, days, or weeks -- but seconds.
- rcpt 2y ago> Drivers now do not want to get stuck at the light, so they are consistently running red lights Police stopped enforcing red lights all over California after covid. And getting cameras installed is a Herculean task.
- hombre_fatal 2y agoThe Texas government decided that red light cameras can't enforce the law. That's how car-brained we are. Muh privacy or something.
- moomin 2y agoIronically, the right to privacy was questioned by Alito when he helped nullify Roe v Wade. It will be "interesting" to see what other things we consider private aren't private in the eyes of this court. And even more "interesting" to see the converse.
- _cenw 2y agoWe have a joke over here in Germany that if you want to commit a crime, be sure to do it in a car - keeps you out of prison.
- rcpt 2y agoInteresting. https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/roe-v-wade-and-supreme-court-abortion-cases#:~:text=Writing%20for%20the%20five%2Djustice,guaranteed%20anywhere%20in%20the%20Constitution https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/roe-....
- ed312 2y agoThe core issue is those red light cameras create a persistent database of who is where, which is then sold at a marginal cost to whoever wants it to advertise to/manipulate/track a population. Adding cameras everywhere invites a dystopian nightmare vs better urban design and occasional traffic police would solve the same problem.
- alkonaut 2y agoKnew before I clicked: it's a flat 4-way intersection of two large-ish streets where there is ample space for something else. Hint: draw a small circle in the middle of the intersection and take down the damn stop signs.
- rcpt 2y agoAre you talking about roundabouts? Those are a nightmare for pedestrians
- ajmurmann 2y agoWith heavy mixed traffic it's a nightmare for everyone. If pedestrians have the right of way (as they should) and there are a lot of them the whole thing would likely become a permanent traffic jam with almost always one car waiting to turn blocking most of the circle.
- amarcheschi 2y agohere in italy at certain roundabouts we have traffic lights that only work when a pedestrian called them. otherwise, the traffic lights flash a flashing yellow light and as a car you can use the roundabout as if the traffic lights didn't exist. it's quite useful, if you ask me, it combines the best of both solutions. of course the traffic light has a countdown so if someone presses it immediately after having worked, it will wait for 30sec/1 min before being red again
- ajmurmann 2y agoThat fixes the issue for cars but it sounds no better for pedestrians than the intersection in the article, right?
- amarcheschi 2y agoPartially true, given the huge congestion that there is, pedestrian have to wait for the green light even if cars aren't moving due to traffic. However, it is situated in quite an important node of traffic going in/out of the city. in smaller roundabouts we just have zebra crossing without lights, while in more dangerous and big ones (eg more lanes or often has heavy traffic) we have traffic lights
- mungoman2 2y agoThis is an annoying change, but the cars in the video weren't actually running any red lights. Doesn't help the case to exaggerate.
- soperj 2y agoIt's a 34 second video. One enters the intersection after the light has turned red (pause the video, you can see it). The other is half way through the intersection before the light turns red, definitely speeds up to make the light, which is what they're talking about.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- AlfeG 2y agoGreen state is very short. 15 seconds is barely enough for 2-3 cars. My guess this force drivers to speedup.
- runako 2y agohttps://imgur.com/a/ASSeakh https://imgur.com/a/ASSeakh
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- whimsicalism 2y agothink it’s just on the margin - they’re in the intersection in this shot and it’s not illegal (at least where i’m from) to be in the intersection when the light turns red
- mungoman2 2y agoThat triangle doesn't mark the stop line though, it's further back. If cars stopped at the triangle they would block pedestrians crossing the street.
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- munchler 2y ago> I captured two drivers ripping through red lights in that short span Video actually shows two cars entering the intersection on yellow lights, which is legal. The rest of the article seems similarly exaggerated. ---- Edit: For those who disagree, please be aware that the stop lines are out of frame, so both cars are already in the intersection before they're visible on the video. You can get a better picture of what the intersection actually looks like here: https://maps.app.goo.gl/L37hZyvXs8BeWmFE8 https://maps.app.goo.gl/L37hZyvXs8BeWmFE8
- xutopia 2y agoOne car enters the intersection on red.
- munchler 2y agoThat's false. The stop line for cars is out of frame in the video, and the driver has already passed it by the time the light turns red. You can get a better view of what the intersection actually looks like here: https://maps.app.goo.gl/L37hZyvXs8BeWmFE8 https://maps.app.goo.gl/L37hZyvXs8BeWmFE8
- DHPersonal 2y agoI think it depends on what one uses as the definition of intersection. Is it the actual point where the two roads collide, or is it at the stop line?
- avgDev 2y agoYou can't be serious. The stop line is where the intersection begins. If you cross the stop line on yellow you won't get a ticket and it is perfectly legal in most US states.
- cosmotic 2y agoNot only legal, but safer than slamming on one's breaks.
- dleslie 2y ago> Why don’t lights ever sit idle with the pedestrian crossing on and the cars must wait? The author knows the answer as well as most readers do: because the intersection is being designed with cars in mind, not human beings.
- _cenw 2y agoI'm about 99% sure that was a rhetorical question so you can ask yourself why we put cars before people.
- nmeofthestate 2y agoUsually a crossing will instantly switch when the pedestrian button is pressed, if enough time has passed since the last "walk" cycle. Having a stage where walk is enabled when there's no pedestrians around wouldn't much help pedestrians, and would introduce inefficiency in throughput. And obviously, drivers can't press a button, so it makes more sense for controls to be accessible to the pedestrians.
- dleslie 2y ago> Having a stage where walk is enabled when there's no pedestrians around wouldn't much help pedestrians, and would introduce inefficiency in throughput It forces drivers to reduce speed and come to a full stop; dramatically decreasing the likelihood of collisions with pedestrians they did not notice.
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- 1970-01-01 2y ago>The story focuses on a redesign of one intersection in this town. The case highlights how we’ve elevated the value of moving cars quickly at the expense of everything else, even in highly walkable areas. We should all expect this kind of regressing in walking. Pedestrians and cyclists don't seem to understand how this always will be a car-by-default country due to lifestyle. Yes, there are several cities bucking the trend with exceptions, but those exceptions are either economically able to buck that car-first engineering trend and build massive bike and walking infra or they have exceptional transportation alternatives (train, bus, and subway).
- hombre_fatal 2y agoYou think pedestrians and cyclists don't realize how car dominant we are?
- 1970-01-01 2y agoCorrect. They expect safe walking and biking infra to fall from the sky and complain online when it does not.
- affinepplan 2y agothis is a very uncharitable characterization of communities' desires for safe, quiet, and walkable/bikeable neighborhoods
- SoftTalker 2y agoIt does sometimes seem that they think they should be able to walk/bike without concern for their own safety. I see pedestrians step into traffic and bicycles blow traffic signals and stop signs all the time. Safety and situational awareness is everyone's responsibility.
- affinepplan 2y agoI guess I kind feel like yeah the person operating the heavy machinery at high speed does bear more responsibility for the damage they cause rather than their victims
- codaea 2y agoIt seems like instead of trying to accommodate cars better, they could have made it worse, so they would avoid that intersection all together, promoting other routes todestinations.
- potato3732842 2y agoAs a pedestrian I will take a busy light controlled intersection with a pedestrian scramble type walk signal over a busy 4-way stop where every single time. With the 4-way stop there is never a time in the cycle when all traffic is stopped. The drivers who are present are continuously paying attention to what other drivers are doing which robs them of situational awareness to note pedestrians. You can try and time it but that's risky. With the walk signal there is a brief moment in time when the drivers are doing nothing but waiting for you and are all stopped so you as a pedestrian can account for them in preparation just before you get your signal and make your move. The author can get lost with this sort of textbook correct but questionable in reality take. Legally having the right of way doesn't make you any less dead when the driver who's got three other drivers to pay attention to doesn't see you.
- itishappy 2y ago> With the 4-way stop there is never a time when all traffic is stopped and the drivers are always paying attention to what other drivers are doing. With the walk signal there is a brief moment in time when the drivers are doing nothing but waiting for you and are all stopped so you as a pedestrian can account for them in preparation just before you get your signal and make your move. That's... not true? With light traffic a 4 way stop should have no cars at all at it most of the time, leaving pedestrians with the right of way, whereas with a traffic light there will always be a road with priority until a pedestrian hits the button. Requiring cars to pay attention to the condition of the intersection is the explicit design goal. This was laid out very clearly in the article we just read.
- potato3732842 2y ago>That's... not true? With light traffic a 4 way stop should have no cars at all at it most of the time, leaving pedestrians with the right of way, whereas with a traffic light there will always be a road with priority until a pedestrian hits the button. Requiring cars to pay attention to the condition of the intersection is the explicit design goal. >This was laid out very clearly in the article we just read. <facepalm> This is what I mean about theory vs reality. 4-way stops don't look like the animation they show you in driver's ed. In practice what happens is that non conflicting traffic tends to parallelize so someone taking a left might start their left while the person across from them is finishing theirs (or one of any other bunch of combinations) so there's a car in motion basically all the time the situational awareness of every driver who's about to get their turn is mostly absorbed in monitoring who's turn it is and who's going where. So when you're a pedestrian and you don't time it right you could find yourself starting to cross right before someone wants to drive where you're crossing. Usually this is because you started walking before it was their turn and they didn't notice you until it was their turn and they started moving (because they were accounting for the other traffic) until it was their turn at which point they started looking where they were going as well. Normally this results in absolutely nothing, you speed up a little, they don't gas it as hard, everyone goes on their merry way. But the potential for things to go badly if the conflicting driver is inattentive or further distracted is very much there. Sure, theoretically the rules say they shouldn't do that but that's not how reality works. There's just so much less potential for conflict if there is a scheduled time when all the cars stop and then the walking happens. Even without a dedicated walk time it's just so much easier to time it when there's a light because you can start walking when all the cars have red and only have to look out for right on red or potential red light runners, it's a much easier problem than the degree of swiveling your head around you need to do to at a busy 4-way.
- thedanbob 2y agoThe county where I live recently (within the last couple of years) redid a two-way stop along the road I take to work. It used to be east-west that had the stop signs, but for some reason they switched them to north-south. Even more baffling, they didn't repaint the stop lines so east-west still had those and north-south didn't. It effectively turned the intersection into a four-way stop with extra confusion, frustration, and danger. They eventually turned it into an actual four-way, thankfully. I think everyone would have been happier if they just hadn't messed with it in the first place.
- baq 2y agoshould've been a roundabout with 0 stops
- HPsquared 2y agoRoundabouts aren't great for pedestrians. You need to trust the drivers' signals.
- baq 2y agoWhere I'm from it's exactly the opposite - straight road means you can't trust drivers to slow down, but any obstacle like a big mound with a road in a circle around it makes them pay attention
- throwawayffffas 2y agoSo he is saying that people are running the red lights but were not running the stop signs. I would bet good money that the people willing to run the red lights would be more likely to run the stop signs than not, especially if they know there are stop signs on the other road.
- GrantMoyer 2y agoPeople usually slow down to run stop signs, but speed up to run red lights.
- Spunkie 2y agoI don't understand how anyone that actually walks and/or drives in north america can come to that conclusion. When a driver is speeding up to "make" a yellow light their attention turns to nothing but the yellow light or even worse the state of the next intersection/light beyond the one they are speeding through. The existence of the green/yellow light gives drivers carte blanche to not need to think about the current state of the crossing because "the light tells me there should be nothing there anyways". Where as a driver slowing down to "roll" a stop sign has their attention set to basically the opposite. They are generally focused on things like, is there a car I'm going to hit? is there a pedestrian crossing? is there a cop down the street waiting to give me a ticket?
- nmeofthestate 2y ago> pedestrians have to press the beg button Please. This is the most drama-queen characterisation of a signal-controlled pedestrian crossing I've ever seen. In fact it's the first time I've seen anyone grinding their teeth at the injustice of a signal-controlled pedestrian crossing.
- rexpop 2y agoHopefully it's not the last. We need to flip the script on cars vs pedestrians, especially since there has been a long history of anti-pedestrian propaganda funded by the automobile industry. Meanwhile, car-centric environments contribute to air pollution and sedentary lifestyles. They limit public spaces, reducing community interactions and fostering loneliness, while also exacerbating socioeconomic inequalities by obstructing access to jobs and essential services for those unwilling or unable to burn cash on these inefficient, extravagant rolling idols of conspicuous consumption. Their environmental impact, I shouldn't have to remind you, doesn't end with urban sprawl leading to inefficient land use and loss of green spaces, but includes, of course, plant-rocking CO2 emissions. So, yeah, I think it's pretty debased that we featherless bypeds have to press a single goddamn button to tread a single square foot of earth in deference to cars.
- nmeofthestate 2y agoI'm a pedestrian, and a car driver, and a cyclist and I think this is a reasonable way to control an intersection. Anti-car urbanism is sliding into being a bit of a pseudo-religion for cranks IMO.
- rexpop 2y agoI want to confirm that it's a religion for me. I'm not a spandex-wearing hobbyist; I ride my bike or take public transit because it is practical and inexpensive. I do not bike for fun. The structure of the built environment which accommodates automobiles is hostile to human life. It has been—in the short run—convenient for the growth of a certain type of economy which is also hostile—in the long run—to human life. As Ben Franklin might say, we have paid too dearly in blood, turf, and CO2 for this strip mall whistle. If anything is worth the reverence of worship—and perhaps nothing, in your philosophy, is—few candidates can compete with the human life, community, and sustainable industry which a car-centric environment precludes. Edit: Oh, except maybe the natural world it threatens.
- simiones 2y agoIt's very strange to complain that cars run red lights, but somehow not stop signs. I expect that if the intersection were as empty as it was when he was filming, you'd easily find people driving at a similar speed regardless of the stop signs too.
- the_sleaze_ 2y agoI know it as the "California Roll" - to slow down but continue to cruise through stop signs.
- floren 2y agoThat's old fashioned, the current "California roll" is to just continue at full speed through stop signs or red lights.
- benjijay 2y agoI am more familiar with (and more partial to) a California Roll consisting of 'crab' sticks, avocado, and cucumber, wrapped in seaweed and then rice.
- simiones 2y agoIn my own country, where stop signs are relatively rare anyway, this behavior is so common that it doesn't even have a name. I think it's much more unexpected here to see anyone truly stop at a stop sign on an empty street than it is to see them slow down and then continue on. And I would bet police would not bat an eye 99% of the time if they saw someone do it.
- itishappy 2y agoMy experience has been that cars will happily roll through stop signs, but at nowhere near full speed like they're doing here.
- adverbly 2y agoI don't know enough about this particular situation, but I wonder if they considered raised pedestrian curb level roundabouts. They can be much better for things like this.
- ajmurmann 2y ago"With the change, the light always sits green for drivers on Palm, so cars are now always flying through that street when they previously had to stop at a stop sign" I used to encounter an infuriating version of this during my commute through SF Mission Bay. There were several lights that clearly were on a timer but wouldn't show the walk signal for pedestrians unless you had pressed the button before the current cycle. In practice this meant that I'd arrive at the intersection that had one or two cars waiting at a red light. This was clearly when I could have gotten a walk signal with no other changes required. However, without the signal I had no idea when it would switch and couldn't walk in front the waiting cars. So I typically ended up waiting till the light turned green for the cars, they drove off and I then crossed as a pedestrian while cars clearly had a green signal but they were gone. I would have had to wait another minute or so for the proper right of way to come around again. Totally bonkers outcome to have to wait for the cars to get a green signal. This would never happen the other way around.
- Ithildin 2y agoAside from the debate, 600k seems insanely high for this intersection. No wonder this country's infrastructure is crumbling when it takes over half a million dollars to put in a few lights.
- prasadjoglekar 2y agoThis sort of work usually costs 3x what is should, because the firm doing the work has to pay state minimum wage and/or hire union labor.
- rafram 2y agoWould it be better if they hired non-union labor at $5/hour (1/3 the minimum wage)? Would you apply for that job?
- ars 2y agoObviously that would be better. If no one applied for the job you raise rates until someone does. You don't artificially start unnecessarily high. If you do you are basically stealing from taxpayers to give gifts to unions.
- rafram 2y agoFortunately for the workers, paying below minimum wage is illegal. (And for what it’s worth, it’s really hard to hire even at minimum wage these days. McDonald’s pays well above $15 in most metro areas - including in states which use the federal minimum.)
- ars 2y agoThe actual scenario at hand is paying 3x wages "just because". You said 1/3 minimum wage as a strawman. Not to mention minimum wages aren't necessary anyway - like you said "it’s really hard to hire even at minimum wage these days". Pay market wages, without external forces driving wages higher. Because, higher wages means higher costs, and if you are government that's essentially theft from your taxpayers.
- duxup 2y agoVery generally, if it is a busy place I actually prefer a highly controlled intersection with clear lights and signs vs 4 way stops. I've had way more problems at 4 way stops than intersections controlled by lights.
- TheMagicHorsey 2y agoI see decisions of the same type being made in the suburbs around here all the time, and the prioritization is identical. I think the issue is suburbanites and small-town folks generally have not experienced a walkable environment and don't understand how pleasant it can be. They are usually ensconced in cars and go isolated from one destination to another without actually touching the community at all. I was trying to advocate for bike lanes and no-through traffic for a few streets near our small town's historic center a few months ago, and I'm sorry to say, to the community, I think I sounded like a weird European hippy. Even though I'm totally not a hippy and I'm American-born. I'm as capitalist as you can get. But I still think if the state is going to make design decisions on our streets, we should make decisions that make our neighborhoods better and ultimately more inviting and valuable. The main opposition to what I was proposing was coming from neighborhoods that must commute from further beyond the city center to get to the highway that connects our town to the nearest major city. We have other, faster, wider roads to get to the highway from all parts of our town, but there are people that are adamant that during rush hour, they must be allowed to potentially commute through the historic downtown, and residential neighborhoods, to avoid traffic jams. I was trying to explain that the bottlenecks are always the main streets that have the highway on-ramps, but to no avail. People like having many potential, fast routes to the highway, and they are deeply uncomfortable with you removing some routes even if they rarely use those routes themselves. In other words, occasional car use is more important than daily, frequent pedestrian use. And where were the pedestrians during this town-hall? For whatever reason there were none. Or if there were, they were silent. I was trying to understand why nobody else was speaking up when there are so many bikers, kids, parents with strollers, walkers with dogs, etc., using these streets that will be impacted by bad decision-making, and my conclusion is that young active people, and those with kids, have no time to go to town-halls. And the kinds of people that do go to town-halls are weirdos with design fetishes, like me, and extremely ornery and conservative people who see any change in their town as an assault on the AMERICAN WAY OF LIFE by perverted European-hippy Democratic Degenerates (into which category I have unfortunately been slotted it seems, though I'm embarrassingly capitalist and libertarian). I would not suggest this will be the median experience in America. My town has a fair number of MAGA lawn signs, American flags, lifted trucks, Punisher stickers, etc., in addition to the tech community. So its a very specific kind of mix. I'm sure those of you in Berkeley or San Francisco will have much better luck. My community has some of the strangest dynamics you have ever seen.
- blackeyeblitzar 2y agoSaving seconds for cars is important. It adds up across all the intersections they cross, and makes travel time shorter. These safetyism arguments are tired because they never honestly consider the tradeoffs, particularly that cars have lots of benefits.
- 1970-01-01 2y agoThis is my take in a nutshell. Instead of trying to force pedestrians and bikers to share with cars, we could go one level better and fully remove pedestrians and bikers from these roads until a city fund for building them a proper bike-only lane has fully matured. The only reason we force them to share public roads is because it seems logical, but the physics and logistics just doesn't work well.
- gs17 2y ago> and fully remove pedestrians and bikers from these roads until a city fund for building them a proper bike-only lane has fully matured. And what do the pedestrians get?
- 1970-01-01 2y agoThey get a concrete maturation date on funding the bike-only lane construction, and also get to die another way than being hit by a truck.
- ElevenLathe 2y agoSo your proposal is to ban bicycles temporarily and walking forever?
- 1970-01-01 2y agoSaying walking is banned is ridiculous. However, if one needs to go from A to B in the USA, road funding will always come first. Whatever comes second should be up to the local voters, and each mode of transport should have separate lanes and be funded separately, as the laws of physics always trump any laws of man.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- BurnGpuBurn 2y agoThe placement of the traffic lights behind the intersection, and not in front of it, is just hilariously incompetent.
- Symbiote 2y agoI'm not a traffic engineer, but I think making this junction more 'European' would mean one or more of: - Forbidding on-street parking close to the junction, improving pedestrian visibility. - Removing the sweeping curves and replacing them with sharp curves, which reduces the speed drivers can turn, and reduces the distance (thus time) pedestrians are in the road. - Adjusting road priorities But maybe it's a lost cause. What's described as a "walkable center" in the article seems to be a multi-lane traffic circle with some landscaping surrounded by excessively wide roads and lots of parked cars. I don't see a single pedestrian-only street.
- throw7 2y agoHuh, is that a diagonal crosswalk? I've never seen that before... does that actually cause a 4 way stop for all cars for pedestrians?
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- shepherdjerred 2y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedestrian_scramble https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedestrian_scramble
- sethammons 2y agoHA! I was about to tell my story and checked the article. My story is ONE block away from this intersection. I used to work a few blocks from this intersection and would walk daily to the train. Crossing the street was daunting, especially when we time changed and it was dark. I started carrying reflective labels on my backback and I wore a strobe light when crossing. I _still_ had people flipping me off, swerving around me, honking, etc for my audacity to use a crosswalk. Going to remote work probably saved my life.
- sesuximo 2y agoWe have the technology to cheaply enforce most driving laws. IMO we should do it.
- briandear 2y agoCars run stop signs too. They also speed. That’s an enforcement opportunity. Claiming this makes the intersection less safe despite the engineering studies that were conducted is a claim made without evidence. Pedestrians not having permanent right of way isn’t a safety issue, as the author admits, it’s a convenience issue. It seems like the author is against cars in principle and uses that bias to complain about something that makes it easier for cars despite having no demonstrable impact on safety. I live near Barcelona and in the city, stop signs are very rare. Its signals everywhere aside from little low-traffic back streets — and Barcelona is perfectly walkable. Cars are more likely to roll through a four way stop than a red traffic light — especially if they don’t see any conflicting traffic. And at night, stop signs are less safe because you might be pulling out and a pedestrian walks out in front of you — while with traffic signals, it’s clear whose turn it is. Cyclists also seem more prone to ignoring 4-way stops than traffic lights. Here’s a study from Montreal that, among its other conclusions, showed that signals had no impact on pedestrian-vehicle interactions. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0022437521000396 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S00224... “… the models were unable to demonstrate a significant relationship between stop signs and vehicle–pedestrian interactions. Therefore, drawing conclusions regarding pedestrian safety is difficult.”
- dheera 2y ago"pedestrians have to press the beg button, wait for the light to cycle through its routine, and then walk across the street" Quite often what happens is - Pedestrian presses button - Light doesn't change for 30 seconds and there are no cars in sight - Pedestrian goes "fuck it" and crosses - Light changes red, after pedestrian is done crossing - Car comes along and gets stopped at red light for 30 seconds
- shepherdjerred 2y agoI wonder why these buttons don't immediately allow pedestrians to cross (maybe with some rate limiting to avoid abuse).
- dheera 2y agoThat, or even use sensors to detect pedestrians coming along that are likely to want to cross, estimate their crossing time based on their walking speed, and make their light turn "go" as soon as they hit the intersection. Some intersections have exactly this for cars already.
- cogman10 2y agoCould someone explain why we always put pedestrian crossings at intersections? I've always felt like that is the most unsafe place for a crossing. In my city, there are a few pedestrian crossings with lights recessed from intersections. The lights turn on only when someone bumps the crossing button (which isn't super common) and only 2 ways of traffic need to stop/watch out.
- gs17 2y agoMy city has those too, and drivers ignore them. Unless you mean one with a proper traffic signal that turns red, ours just turn on yellow flashing lights.
- cogman10 2y agoWe have both. I agree the yellow flashing ones don't do shit. Even as a driver it can be hard to even see when those lights are flashing which makes them pointless. The overhead red, though, works great.
- whimsicalism 2y agobecause drivers generally actually stop at red lights? pedestrian crossings in the middle of the road are typically much less safe in my experience because a considerably proportion of drivers do not yield. i think driving norms in other countries around yielding to crosswalks also seem to be different aka non-existent
- estebank 2y ago1) it makes the travel of a pedestrian going straight become a zig zag where you have to weave into streets that you don't care about. You end up minimizing distance for cars but maximizing distance for pedestrians. It should be the other way around 2) HAWK signals, which are pedestrian buttons affecting lights on pedestrian crossings away from intersections (usually on stroads) have been shown to be worse than nothing because drivers don't really notice them nor the pedestrians (in drivers heads "intersection" equals "watch out for cross traffic, everywhere else it's "go forward and pay attention to the car in front of you"), and pulls some pedestrians to an unwarranted sense of safety. 3) "which isn't super common" tells me that this a very car dependent place. There's a mid block pedestrian light on mission between 1st and 2nd in SF, and there's always someone waiting on it to change. Part of the reason it's there is because there's a straight pedestrian route that allows you to get from Market Street to the terminal.
- jollyllama 2y agoI think the real reason this happened is staring the author in the face. He noted the necessary engineering and construction work, and some of the price tags for that and the maintenance. I think this has less to do with any car-friendly ideology, conscious or unconscious, and it's just a boondoggle for engineering, construction, and maintenance firms.
- parshimers 2y agoIt's too bad they didn't put a roundabout here, there's one in the middle of old town Orange and it works pretty well. Terrible waste of money to make the intersection worse like they did. It also says something that the behavior of the cars here isn't even illegal in California. Entering an intersection on yellow and exiting on red is fine. Right turn on red is also allowed, and many people combine that with a California stop (though that last part isn't legal). All of the above are extremely hazardous for pedestrians and encourage speeding.
- mig39 2y agoI hate the idea of crosswalks at intersections. I know it's tradition, and why they exist. But wouldn't it make more sense to have crosswalks in between the intersections? ie: a few hundred feet away from where vehicles are intersecting with each other?
- HDThoreaun 2y agoDrivers would have to stop more and they have far more political power than pedestrians so this won’t happen. Many large cities have crosswalks away from intersections and drivers tend to ignore them
- iggldiggl 2y agoThat'd only make sense if your pedestrian network is completely independent from the road network, so pedestrians only need to cross roads, but otherwise never interact with them. However the usual case is that pedestrians have to walk along the road because there's no separate independent pedestrian network, and in that case not providing crosswalks at intersections forces detours on everybody wanting to walk straight on ahead.
- AndyMcConachie 2y agoAs someone who lives in The Netherlands I basically just don't understand anything about traffic/pedestrian engineering in the USA. I travel to the USA quite frequently and I never quite know what the rules are as a pedestrian. I've learned to look both ways and move quickly, but I don't have the confidence or assertiveness that I do at home.
- toast0 2y ago> With the change, the light always sits green for drivers on Palm, so cars are now always flying through that street when they previously had to stop at a stop sign. Why don’t lights ever sit idle with the pedestrian crossing on and the cars must wait? Where I live, this doesn't happen because there's not enough pedestrians to justify it. When I drive in Seattle, the lights never idle, but pedestrian cycles are always included. With a non-scramble intersection, not including pedestrians by default allows for faster cycling, including for pedestrians that want to cross the alternate way. With a scramble intersection, I'd bet if a pedestrian shows up and pushes the button, an idle green will go yellow immediately. Yes, it's a longer wait than crossing immediately as you would at an idle intersection, but now you can cross diagonally, so that may be a win. It's worth checking with the traffic engineer to see how they would decide to always include a pedestrian cycle, perhaps during times of high pedestrian use like during hours where students are likely to cross the street between classes.
- toast0 2y agoToo late to edit, but another option which may be too late for this intersection would be to add intend to cross buttons (or other ways of detecting pedestrian intent) farther from the intersection. Many intersections have vehicle detectors farther from the intersection which allows the traffic controller to reduce waiting by lengthening or reducing cycle times in anticipation of traffic that will arrive soon. For example: if there is a dominate traffic direction, the controller can idle at green, and traffic in that direction will often not have to wait. With detectors only at the light, traffic in the opposite direction would need to wait when it arrives; with further back sensors, traffic in the opposite direction can initiate a cycle change earlier and may not need to come to a stop at all. Or cycles in one direction can be lengthened if there is traffic detected at the light and at the further back sensor, which indicates potentially high demand in that direction, especially if the further back sensor stays active which could indicate vehicles are backed up all the way to that sensor. That's less applicable for a pedestrian detector, pedestrian backups are uncommon unless there's an event, at which point it's common to use police/traffic officers to direct traffic or a specialized event mode enabled by a physical control supervised by an officer; but indicators of more pedestrians does justify increasing the pedestrian cycle time.
- pfdietz 2y agoExample of an insideously unsafe intersection that was changed to make it safer (for bike riders): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SYeeTvitvFU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SYeeTvitvFU How it was fixed: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OpgpE6wjF30 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OpgpE6wjF30
- giantg2 2y agoEh, batching is pretty efficient, whether the traffic is people/cars or digital. I wonder if the other safety issue about running red lights has a baseline for comparison with people running stop signs. I see both happening near me.
- bigbacaloa 2y ago[dead]
- scotty79 2y agoInteresting thing here is blinking red for pedestrians before it turns solid red, indicating that you should finish crossing. In Poland blinking green has the same meaning. In Berlin and Sydney green for pedestrians is very short and basically lets you enter the crossing. But red doesn't mean you shouldn't be on the crossing. You can take as much time as you need to finish crossing. It feels way better from pedestrian perspective when compared to Polish system where green means you are safe, blinking green means you need to run for your life and red means that drivers can legally run you over and you are about die (they can't but that's how it feels).
- iggldiggl 2y ago> You can take as much time as you need to finish crossing. Well, up to a certain extent at least. Behind the scenes, German traffic lights for example usually assume you continue walking at 1.2 m/s – if you start crossing at the last possible moment and are slower than that, you will still run into the case where crossing traffic will potentially get a green signal with you still on the road.
- scotty79 2y agoThanks for clarification. Sure, but as a pedestrian you have no way of telling if you took too long so the burden of not hitting you is firmly placed on the drivers. In Poland it's bit more muddy in drivers' minds. If they hit a pedestrian who was still crossing the road while the light for him was red they think it's partially pedestrian's fault because he shouldn't be there.
- jmyeet 2y agoAs a frequent pedestrian, the question of traffic light vs four-way stop sign depends on the details. Here are some factors: - In NYC, for example, right turn on red is illegal within the five boroughs (you can always spot NJ drivers you don't know this or don't care). Right turning on red is incredibly dangerous for cyclists and pedestrians, way more than traffic lights vs four-way stop signs; - How often the light changes is a HUGE factor. I've read that there are some pedestrian crossings in LA at lights that take up to 10 minutes to change. Ridiculous. But in NYC, or at least Manhattan, light changes are quick. I suspect it's designed so a pedestrian never has to wait more than ~45 seconds; - One way streets are better than two-way streets. There are less variables to be concerned with. Drivers may not like one-way streets. They're demonstrably better for traffic flow, pedestrians and cyclists however; - Having an island in the middle of a two-way road is HUGELY helpful to both cyclists and pedestrians. The ability to cross halfway in relative safety makes an incredible difference; - Having separate walk lights for each direction when there is an island is the absolute worst. This typically hugely increases the time to cross as they aren't coordinated; - The speed limit matters. If the speed limit is under 25, cars rarely go too fast to be a problem. I've had Google Maps street directions that were basically "just make a run for it" across a highway with a speed limit of 45. There are places that say a road has a cycle path that is basically the hard shoulder on an interstate. Drivers will weave through those at 70+ to overtake 1 car. People have died that way; - Traffic lights can decrease safety because drivers will speed up to make a yellow light. Usually I don't even have to look at a traffic light to tell when it turns yellow. I'll hear the engines revving up. I've nearly been killed this way when a driver accelerated to make what was a red light and they sped through a pedestrian crossing that had signalled pedestrians had right of way. This doesn't tend to happen at four-way stops. - As a cyclist, I tend to find drivers give you deference at four-way stops but this may depend on the area and if it has a lot of cyclists and pedestrians. I actually prefer to give drivers the right-of-way when they have it. For example, a driver may stop at a four-way stop seeing me coming when they got there first and should just go. And I know I wasn't going fast enough to interfere with them anyway. This forces me to ride in front of them when they have right of way. I never like doing that. So it's hard for me to judge this particular intersection without knowing the full context.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]