Tuesday, July 25, 2006

Why not foot-traffic engineering?

An example of the past thinking of traffic management can be found in the report on Hollenbeck Avenue/Harvard Avenue Traffic Control:

"On the segment of Hollenbeck between Danforth and Remington, the average speed is 32 mph and the 85th percentile speed is 36mph. These are much closer to the posted speed limit than is normally found." The speed limit is 30. There are a number of driveways lining the street, as well as two side streets (Knickerbocker and Harvard) within this area that may bring down the speed. It thus seems clear that the majority of the drivers are speeding - and this is one of the better streets. If fines, are at least sufficient to cover enforcement cost, the road could be made safer with no net cost to taxpayers.

Regarding removing parking at the Harvard/Hollenbeck intersection, staff objected that "Individual residences front onto Hollenbeck. The removal of parking would probably cause a hardship or inconvenience to these residents. The greater concern is whether the City should take action that might encourage pedestrian crossings at this location." Thus its more important to preserve unused free parking than to provide facilities for pedestrians. Alas, they had no study to determine the demand for free parking on the street. Based on the use (or lack thereof), the hardship would be that somebody would be required to park their car in the driveway instead of the street. And in the worst case, they may have to walk at most an extra hundred feet to their parked vehicle. Meanwhile, staff's preferred alternative is to require pedestrians to walk an extra 1250 feet to Remmington or Danforth. (Walking a few feet is a great hardship for drivers, but a 1000 feet is ideal for pedestrians.

Another interesting bit was the use of traffic "warrants" to justify the placement of a signal. They use the current pedestrian counts to say that a signal is not justified. However, elsewhere, they object to enhancements that might increase pedestrian crossings. IF the enhancement would increase the number of crossings, shouldn't this estimated increase be used as the basis of the pedestrian count? And if it is really a goal to encourage the environmental, economic and health benefits of pedestrians as opposed to automobiles, shouldn't they take priority over cars through movement.

In the end, the city council barely rejected adding a traffic light by a 4-3 vote.
It is interesting to compare the statement from a city council member to that of the staff report. The council member investigated the conditions: "I was out there measuring today and the sidewalk is not wide enough in many places. There is not even a buffer between the sidewalk and Hollenbeck. And in some places utility poles are set smack in the middle of the sidewalk."
Meanwhile, staff, without investigating the conditions "was a bit surprised by input received at the Neighborhood Meeting. Apparently some parents feel that it is unacceptable for their children to walk on the sidewalk on Hollenbeck. Using only internal neighborhood streets does add some walking distance to reach the signals at either Danforth or Remington. While staff agrees that it might be preferable to use less traveled streets, it does not think there is anything wrong with students walking on the Hollenbeck sidewalks. Admittedly, a very unusual accident can occur anywhere, but walking on a sidewalk adjacent to a vertical curb on a street with Hollenbeck's relatively slow speeds does not seem inherently unsafe."
Thus staff was more than willing to adhere by rules and manuals but not to take a little effort to see current conditions. (And if utility poles blocked Hollenbeck itself reducing it to a total of one 7 foot wide lane, would they have noticed that?
In this case a full time light may not be justified. (It may actually be preferable to have a non-signaled interchange to limit 'waiting' for a light. However, that was never mentioned in the report.

Similarly, the city council had voted not to expand Wolfe/El Camino. In the staff report, a key concern was not letting the intersection fall to "LOS F" which could reduce funding due to Congestion management programs. Nowhere in the report are bicycle or pedestrian concerns covered. (In fact, the only mention of the words is in reference to meetings held by the bicycle and pedestrian committee. They obviously had knowledge of the committee meetings, but did not take them in to account.)

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