Biking 1.5 miles to school today, my kid & I...
1. waited while a school bus ran a stop sign
2. swerved to avoid a car passing us on the left as we turned left
3. sat at a light for 4 min to get a walk signal
4. slammed on the brakes to not get t-boned by an SUV in a crosswalk
We don't pollute, make noise, cause pavement wear, or threaten anyone's safety. Yet our roads still force us to defer to cars or risk death.
And we're the entitled ones? Entitled to what??
While this isn't a typical day, it's not uncommon. Fortunately my kid has learned to never trust a car (or anyone in it), and has developed excellent defensive cycling skills. But she's still a kid, which means she's still not capable of processing all the info needs to process to judge risks appropriately and quickly. And this means multiple threat situations, like the one here, could easily be deadly to her.
https://www.google.com/maps/@35.9063401,-79.0186834,140m/data=!3m1!1e3?entry=ttu
This intersection, at Burning Tree Rd and Raleigh Rd in
#ChapelHillNC has a greenway that dumps us 10' away from the crosswalk. The crosswalk has an automatic walk signal, which is nice, but that signal means diddly squat for safety. Because at the same it's telling us to go into the crosswalk, drivers from 3 different directions have permission to cross the crosswalk. Yes, legally drivers must yield to crosswalk users but in practice, they rarely do.
@DrTCombs ask the road agency to program the signal for a leading pedestrian interval. This gets people moving into the crosswalk a head start and more visible before the signal turns green for drivers.
@jeroenvanbergen @enobacon This is what I've been hoping for. If you tell me it's my turn to go, then it should be my turn to go. Not my turn to share with things that can kill me.
Otherwise, what's the point? What's the point in waiting for a walk signal that doesn't provide me any more safety than going whenever I see a gap in traffic?
@jeroenvanbergen @DrTCombs @enobacon We've been getting more LPIs in Seattle, and they are working well. When I'm waiting for the light in a bike lane, i can get a head start by following the LPI. (Yes, bikes are allowed to follow pedestrian signals here.)
@jeroenvanbergen @daihard @enobacon LPI is an improvement, but it's far from perfect for 2 reasons:
1. we still allow RTOR, meaning that anyone who wants to turn right across the path of crosswalk users can do so regardless of the LPI
2. if a user comes up on the walk signal while it's active (and this is a busy road, so the walk signal is active for a long time), they don't benefit from the LPI. You have to be at the intersection at the exact moment the walk sign comes on for the LPI to help
@DrTCombs @jeroenvanbergen @enobacon I agree on both points. Turning on red must be banned IMO, at the very least at busy intersections.
@DrTCombs @jeroenvanbergen an LPI would give you a few seconds of head-start to yourselves but traffic Eng are reluctant to delay cars more, unless you can get more pedestrians to compete with car counts (yes the signal phase would induce this demand if adequately situated in a safe network etc...) I have seen a red light phase on a right-turn-only lane for the length of the crosswalk cycle but it gets a green with an adjacent left phase, & not posted no-turn-on-red so technically not exclusive
@DrTCombs @enobacon Exactly. The physics are very simple: if two objects are not at the same time in the same space they cannot collide. So separating in time or space helps to avoid collisions. If the separation depends on rules it is a lot less safe when compared to real separation in time/space.