The Problem with the Downtown Crosswalks, Catalogued
Over the last year, the four intersections comprising the downtown square received a much-needed upgrade to the streetlights and crosswalk signals. With smarter technology, these crosswalks are able to be tweaked as needed. This is good because the current set-up is proving problematic, even dangerous, for pedestrians in the downtown area.
Before we begin cataloguing the issues, it is important to point out that all transportation engineering is social engineering. You are guiding the behavior of the people behind the various modes of transit by your design, your rules, and your signs. This engineering is an extension of your values. If your goal is to make cars move through an area as quickly as possible, then that can be achieved. Conversely, if your goal is to make an area supremely safe and welcoming for people of all ages to walk, linger, and leave their car far away, that can be achieved, too.
The issues described below come from a place of valuing pedestrians over cars in the downtown area.
ISSUE #1: Crosswalk signals are only triggered by the push of a button
On the surface, this sounds just fine: you walk up to an intersection, push a button, and wait for the crosswalk signal to turn green. But this creates a number of problematic scenarios:
You walk up to the intersection right after the signal changed allowing for traffic to go in the direction you are hoping to head. You can push the button all you want, but that won’t trigger a green crosswalk light until a full cycle of traffic lights. You can be standing with a green light for cars, but you can’t (legally) cross for a long while.
For some people, they figure this out and just cross anyway, like this couple heading South at the intersection of Hickory and Elm:
What makes this matter worse, the one-way streets downtown mean that you only have a view to the status of the green light in one direction. So if you get impatient with the lack of crosswalk signals, you have to do something like this:
The other issue this brings is confusion for both cars and pedestrians. Unless you walk this area daily and are tuned in to these anomalies, you will face uncertainty at every intersection, wondering what is going on. Drivers of cars now have a difficult task. Under the current situation, a driver of a car has to pay attention to two different lights to know what they can do: both the traffic signal and the crosswalk signal to know who has the right of way in any given situation.
SUGGESTION ON HOW TO SOLVE THIS ISSUE: Make crosswalk signals automatic with the changing of traffic lights without the requirement of pushing the button to trigger it.
ISSUE #2: There is inconsistency in how long a crosswalk signal is green compared to how long the traffic light stays green.
This issue is varied from intersection to intersection. In some cases, the crosswalk sign counts down to the point when the traffic light turns yellow. And I would argue that with the narrow street that we have downtown, this is just about the right way to do it. However, in a few cases, the pedestrian signal counts down to the red hand a full 30 seconds before the cars heading in the same direction get a yellow light. Once you figure this out, you are inclined to walk anyway because you know you have the time to do it - but without a cross signal allowing you to do so. What makes this dangerous is precisely the inconsistency. Pedestrians should know what the time down to the red hand means and that should be the same in every intersection in downtown.
Here’s an example of a short crosswalk time followed by 30 seconds of an additional green light for cars going in the same direction:
Here’s the same thing at the corner of Locust and Hickory:
SUGGESTION ON HOW TO SOLVE THIS ISSUE: Make all crosswalk signal timings consistent by timing them to count down to the red hand at the same time the traffic signal for cars traveling in that direction get a yellow light.
ISSUE #3: The traffic signals are timed to make it easy for North/South traffic through the square at high rates of speed.
Earlier I mentioned that all traffic engineering was social engineering - here’s where this can be seen. If you make it easy for car drivers who have no other interest in the square other than it is the quickest way between their origin somewhere else and their destination somewhere else, then this will become their go-to route. Pay attention to the traffic patterns of the square around 8am and 5pm to see the large amount of pass through commuter traffic.
The traffic signals are timed in a such a way to accommodate this and make it easier for vehicles. The North/South traffic signals are timed to be much longer in length (at all four intersections) than the East/West traffic signals. This results in cars frequently hitting green lights at both the Hickory and Oak intersections when they are traveling through the square either North or South. As you can guess, that is engineered to allow for higher rates of speed for those just cutting through the square.
If you are a pedestrian, it means you have longer wait times if you want to travel East/West at any of the intersections - all so those cars can get through more quickly.
It’s OK to make it a pain in the neck for cars to simply cut through the square. They have options on Bell or Carroll just a few blocks away. This is the sort of traffic and social engineering that shows our values for pedestrians in our most walked corridor in town.
SUGGESTION ON HOW TO SOLVE THIS ISSUE: Re-examine traffic signal timings and adopt timings that do not encourage unnecessary and fast vehicular cut-throughs on the square.
If you would like to see some of these changes made, please share this post with your favorite city council member or traffic engineer.
AUTHOR: Kevin Roden
