Grid Control, Vol. 5: Egg on HWC Engineering's well-compensated face as it botches Spring Street's westbound bike buffer cross hatching.

The Green Mouse thanks an intrepid onlooker for pointing to something we've missed.

"Buffered bike lanes are conventional bicycle lanes paired with a designated buffer space separating the bicycle lane from the adjacent motor vehicle travel lane and/or parking lane."-- National Association of City Transportation Officials

The hash marks in the buffer are called cross hatching. As you can see from the two diagrams, cross hatching in the buffer should be "aimed" forward.

In what will be the new eastbound lane on Spring Street, the cross hatching is painted correctly.

But in the westbound lane, it's backwards.

The cross hatching is "aimed" the wrong way on the north side of Spring. The lines should be giving at least the subliminal signal that you should keep your west-moving car to the left of the buffer, but as painted, they imply that you should veer right.

Not only that, but as we observed previously, the parking spaces on the north side of Spring are consistently 6 to 8 inches less deep from curb to line, enhancing the prospect of cyclists being "doored."

Not only that, but this subliminal cue stands to make an already bad situation at Spring and 10th even worse.

I'm told HWC Engineering's top-dollar engineers drew up the cross hatching the wrong way, and the contractors did exactly as they were told.

Will the cross hatching error be fixed?

And if not, doesn't HWC owe taxpayers a refund?

Previously:

Grid Control, Vol. 4: But this actually isn't a bus lane, is it?

Grid Control, Vol. 3: TARC's taking your curbside church parking, says City Hall.

Grid Control, Vol. 2: Southsiders get six more parking inches, but you gotta love those 10-foot traffic lanes on Spring.

Grid Control, Vol. 1: You people drive so freaking horribly that someone's going to die at Spring and 10th.