Gahan eats a Danish, installs campaign finance-themed pedestrian crossing signals.

The Green Mouse received a link from a friend: Danish city installs Viking-themed pedestrian crossing signals (text below). What happened next was very predictable.

It's 2:00 a.m., and a phone rings near Main Street, muffled by the ornamental grasses in a nearby median.

"See here, Rosenbarger. This Viking crosswalk light thingy has potential. Didn't the Vikings raid and pillage everywhere they went? That's some really good shit, but $150 to convert the lights? Say what? How do those Danish mayors get their families to Disney World twice a year on $150? Look, some of our Special Friends can do these for at least $500 each, although you need to make sure we're getting the volume warehouse discount for $100 actual cost, then we can convert every light in the city and put those cute anchors on them -- wait, that's no fun, how about my FACE on each one?

"HAH! That Chowchewsku guy never managed THAT, did he?"

Now for the straight dope.

Danish city installs Viking-themed pedestrian crossing signals

Aug. 26 (UPI) -- A city in Denmark is celebrating its Viking heritage by replacing the crosswalk signal lights with the images of the historic Scandinavian warriors.

The city of Aarhus, which was founded by Vikings in the 8th century, unveiled the first of the Viking-themed crossing signals Monday. The city is planning to install the lights at 17 crossings in the city.

Buenyamin Simsek, a councilor in the Aarhus city planning department, pitched the scheme early in the year and the Moesgaard Museum, located just outside of the city, teamed up with officials to bring the idea to fruition.

Officials said each walking signal costs about $150 to convert.

Team Gahan always doubles down on car-centrism, but "Seattle Tosses Out (the) Rulebook to Protect Pedestrians."

Just think about all those times when the bored of works enumerated the many splendid reasons why they couldn't (wouldn't) help make our streets safe.

Just think about city engineer Larry Summers' passive-aggressive protests -- but traffic flow, but INDOT, but whatever else springs to an obstructionist's mind.

Just think about how different it would be if their first response wasn't "here's why we can't and won't help" but "we'll find a way to help."

Just think if the latter constituted Jeff Gahan's instructions to pliant campaign donors like HWC Engineering, rather than deploying them to defend the car-centric status quo.

Just think if Greg Phipps had the chutzpah to disagree with his overlord to insist on making the situation better, rather than meekly accepting the status quo.

We'll stop there. After all, "just thinking" is precisely what they're not doing.

#FireGahan2019

Seattle Tosses Out Rulebook to Protect Pedestrians, by Angie Schmitt (Streetsblog)

Seattle will begin adding safe crosswalks without first assessing if high numbers of pedestrians are going to use them — a direct contradiction of the nation’s road design Bible.

The Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices states that before communities can add a signalized crosswalk — a crosswalk with a traffic light — there must be at least 93 pedestrians that cross at the location every hour. If pedestrian traffic is insufficient, the manual will also allow a signalized crosswalk only if five pedestrians were struck by drivers (think about that) at that location within a year.

In recent years, some progressive transportation engineers have challenged this rule, noting it subordinates pedestrian safety to the speedy flow of car traffic. (Indeed, as transportation planners sometimes joke, you can’t determine the need for a bridge by measuring how many people are swimming across the river.)

In Seattle, the city’s lead engineer, Dongho Chang, announced that the city was “piloting a new approach” to crossings on its greenway system. The city will add the crosswalk and the signal and then count how many pedestrians cross and see if it reaches the threshold that the MUTCD recommends.

According to Chang, the first experiment — at Ballard Avenue — was successful.

Eventually, some engineers hope, Seattle’s experiment will push other cities to try a new approach and, eventually, encourage action by the national committee responsible for updating the MUTCD. It’s especially important given the sharp increase pedestrian fatalities in recent years.

This means you: "STOP FUCKING DRIVING YOUR CAR AT PEOPLE."

This insightful comment to a fine rant clarifies the problem of bad design affecting outcomes. Perhaps Larry Summers can elucidate, assuming Dear Leader permits "truthful dialogue" within city limits.

"This is largely a problem of bad design of North American intersections, compounded by MUTCD and its Canadian equivalent. Cut to Germany (and many other places), where traffic lights are aligned between the stop line and the crosswalk. There are no traffic signals on the opposite side of the intersection (though in places like the UK, there will be two lights at the stop line, on either side of the nearside, and one light on the far side). This forces drivers to stop before the crosswalk and makes it almost impossible for drivers to see the light if they pull forward. North American roadway design is dangerous in its neglect for the safety of pedestrians."

We already know what Pat McLaughlin would say: "Can't they just drive like everyone else who matters?"

Meanwhile, the author is Canadian, and the problem is universal.

STOP FUCKING DRIVING YOUR CAR AT PEOPLE, by Jonathan McLeod (Steps from the Canal)

Often when I’m crossing a street–on my bike or walking or walking with my small children–a driver will be slowly driving at me. They’ll be creeping past the stop line and into the crosswalk, hoping to go through right after I clear their fender. Make no mistake, I’ll have the right of way. They’ll be waiting at a stop sign or looking to turn right on a red.

A lot of you do this, and here’s the thing; I don’t care how nice you are out of your car, how caring, how altruistic, how thoughtful; when you do this, when you creep towards a vulnerable road user–especially young children–you’re being an asshole.

Stop it. It’s rude. It’s threatening. It’s selfish. It’s intimidating. It’s fucking dangerous.

Recently, a New York driver did this. And she killed a one-year-old and three-year-old, and sent a pregnant woman to the hospital. From the story:

The woman told officers that she was creeping up a bit at the intersection in anticipation of the red light changing and then accidentally hit the accelerator, according to the Post report, which cited information from sources.

Make no mistake about it, this woman is a murderer, if the word is to mean anything at all. She intentionally drove her car at people, then “accidentally” accelerated at them.

Because New York authorities take things so seriously, they let the killer go ...

"Walking While Black": If you think car-centrism sucks, welcome to pedestrian racial profiling.

We've been here before.

Walking is not a crime: Dunman and others on the scourges of jaywalking in auto-erotic America.

But this one's a whole different twist on the prevailing inanity.

Walking While Black, by Topher Sanders and Kate Rabinowitz, ProPublica, and Benjamin Conarck, Florida Times-Union

Jacksonville’s enforcement of pedestrian violations raises concerns that it’s another example of racial profiling.

THE JACKSONVILLE SHERIFF’S OFFICE issues hundreds of pedestrian citations a year, drawing on an array of 28 separate statutes governing how people get around on foot in Florida’s most populous city. There is, of course, the straightforward jaywalking statute, barring people from crossing against a red light. But in Jacksonville, pedestrians can also be ticketed for crossing against a yellow light, for “failing to cross a street at a right angle,” for not walking on the left side of a road when there are no sidewalks, or alternatively for not walking on a sidewalk when one is available.

The sheriff’s office says the enforcement of the full variety of pedestrian statutes is essential to keeping people alive in a city with one of the highest pedestrian fatality rates in the nation. The office also says the tickets are a useful crime-fighting tool, allowing officers to stop suspicious people and question them for guns and or drugs.

However, a ProPublica/Florida Times-Union analysis of five years of pedestrian tickets shows there is no strong relationship between where tickets are being issued and where people are being killed. The number of fatal crashes involving pedestrians, in fact, climbed every year from 2012 to 2016, the most recent years for which complete data is available.

What the analysis does show is that the pedestrian tickets — typically costing $65, but carrying the power to damage one’s credit or suspend a driver’s license if unpaid — were disproportionately issued to blacks, almost all of them in the city’s poorest neighborhoods. In the last five years, blacks received 55 percent of all pedestrian tickets in Jacksonville, while only accounting for 29 percent of the population. Blacks account for a higher percentage of tickets in Duval County than any other large county in Florida.

Blacks, then, were nearly three times as likely as whites to be ticketed for a pedestrian violation. Residents of the city’s three poorest zip codes were about six times as likely to receive a pedestrian citation as those living in the city’s other, more affluent 34 zip codes.

Tickets for some of the less familiar statutes were issued even more disproportionately to blacks. Seventy-eight percent of all tickets written for “walking in the roadway where sidewalks are provided” were issued to blacks. As well, blacks accounted for 68 percent of all recipients of tickets issued for “failing to cross the road at a right angle or shortest route” ...

There are at least two types of water parks in New Albany: TIF-tastic Showplaces and Inadvertent Crosswalk Meltdowns.

At Monday evening's city council meeting, at-large councilman David Aebersold (R) reported that he'd been told about photographs somewhere on-line -- he couldn't recall where -- depicting the numerous Inadvertent Crosswalk Meltdown water parks, splash pads and wading pools downtown, like this:

And this:

Funny -- I thought the gag order against mentioning NA Confidential aloud in public extended only to Democrats.

By the way, did you know that if a Democrat is caught actually reading an NAC post, the penalty is a mandatory term paper on the Wit and Wisdom of Chairman Dickey?

That's cruel and unusual punishment, folks. By the way, we reported the standing water problem several months ago -- twice. The newspaper's tally?

That'd be zero. 

June 26
City Hall unveils new street corner splash pads, with an ingenious example of the "sharing economy."

July 29
All hail New Gahanian crosswalk puddle-a-bility: Brand new asphalt, concrete and ramps, and the same old non-drainage problem.

The Board of Public Works and Safety's Mickey Thompson was on hand Monday night to explain that it's all the fault of ADA requirements for handicapped-accessible ramps, and he isn't sure what can be done to correct it.

And yet as it pertains to troubled drivers, no stone is left unturned to facilitate passage of automobiles.

Hats off to CM Aebersold for broaching the subject. Every other council person should join Aebersold in demanding a better answer than Thompson's -- or, conversely, a jackhammer.

Forget the excuses.

How does Jeff Gahan FIX the problem?

"Pedestrians, who are supposed to have the right-of-way, are required to press a button at an intersection in order to get a walk signal, which should happen automatically."

And while we're on the topic of our spanking new beg buttons ...

ABOUT THOSE PESKY PEDESTRIAN CROSSING BUTTONS ..., by Rachel Quednau (Strong Towns)

If you've ever walked on a sidewalk, you've probably encountered the "beg button" at one point or another. That's the button you press in order to get a pedestrian walk signal to light up on the other side of the road. As Alissa Walker writes in a recent Gizmodo article: "Those little buttons on walk signals have been nicknamed "beg buttons"—because walkers are pretty much begging to be able to cross."

This is problematic for a number of reasons, but the biggest is the obvious prioritization of car movement over pedestrian movement. Do car drivers have to pull up to each intersection, lean out their window and push a button in order to get a green light? No, they just wait and the light appears. The Gizmodo article continues:

It's annoying for walkers: have you ever tried to walk a few blocks, stopping to hit the button at every single intersection? Or hit the button just a few seconds too late and had to wait a whole additional cycle? But it also illustrates the backwardness of our street design: pedestrians, who are supposed to have the right-of-way, are required to press a button at an intersection in order to get a walk signal, which should happen automatically.

We know that walkability creates value in a community. It invites people out onto the streets, interacting with one another, visiting local businesses and participating in the livelihood of a place. So why do our cities, time and again, in so many different ways, continue to limit the most basic form of human movement and make it more and more challenging to walk?

The end of the beginning: "Blame the road design, not the phone."

When one's only strong impression about street design is that it should facilitate his or her rapid passage through populated urban areas, certain nuances are bound to be missed -- "steamrolled" might be a better way of putting it.

Here in New Albany, two-way streets are being put into service this month without the ballyhooed "enhanced" crosswalks being finished. The first such crosswalk was installed earlier this year at Main at W. 1st following a period of years during which City hall insisted it couldn't be done.

ASK THE BORED: Tucson's first rainbow crosswalk -- and we get stuck with dozens of lousy anchors enabled by municipal cowardice.

CM David Barksdale added that in his experience, the flashing lights not only fail to make an impression on drivers far too busy checking their iPhones, but also taper off too quickly once daring walkers have waded into the street.

Allow me to add that if solar-activated yellow flashing lights do not convince drivers to yield to pedestrians, soon-to-be ubiquitous sharrow symbols painted on streets do not convince drivers to share space with bicyclists.

Except that Main Street really hasn't been calmed in terms of design, has it?

With everything being done to encourage humans to pass on foot from the south side to the north side, and vice versa, Main Street remains a high-speed wasteland of automobile-centric design all the way from the sewage treatment plant to the beginning of the beautification area on Mansion Row.

The enhanced crosswalk at W. 1st is pleasant enough, but until street design on both sides supports its use -- and assuming drivers give a damn -- it's a very small pleasantry, indeed.

Just remember: The current realization of two-way streets and improved street design is not the end of a necessary adjustment to New Albany's auto-centric streets.

It's just the end of the beginning. Note that yet another media source blames the car for the accident .. not the driver.

BLAME THE ROAD DESIGN, NOT THE PHONE, by Rachel Quednau (Strong Towns)

In one of many recent news stories on "distracted walking," WPVI-TV Philadelphia reports that a "girl chatting on FaceTime [was] struck and critically injured by [a] car in Abington." As Lloyd Alter, writing for TreeHugger, summarizes it:

There was a serious crash recently near Philadelphia; a fourteen year old girl was crossing a street in a crosswalk, in a school zone, with signs posted on posts and tent signs all over the place saying that pedestrians have right of way. There are no trees, no obstructions, no reason whatsoever that the driver couldn't see that there was a pedestrian.

And yet, unsurprisingly, the WPVI-TV article focuses almost solely on the fact that the now-critically injured girl was on her iPhone when she was hit and implies that she is to blame for her injuries. In the 27-sentence article, there are only two mentions of the driver who struck this high schooler—one to explain that the driver stopped the car after the crash and the other mentioning that "no charges have been filed at this time."

In the article, we read about how bystanders dutifully called 911, how first responders rushed the girl to the hospital, and even how school counselors "have been made available to her peers." However, nowhere do we read that local officials are reassessing the design of the road on which this crash occurred to prevent future crashes from happening ...

Grid Control, Volume 25: If Breakwater's overflow parking has been "donated" by AT&T, why weren't crosswalks installed for residents to access it?

I'll keep this one brief.

Looking back to September 1, 2015, we find city officials answering prospective Breakwater parking concerns. The critical passage is underlined.

New Albany apartments receive zoning approval, by Daniel Suddeath (Free pass for DNA Digest)

Project cost now up to $26 million

 ... New Albany Planning Director Scott Wood acknowledged there will likely be a "battle" for on-street parking, but added that's a concern Flaherty and Collins will have to address if it becomes a problem.

Residents moving into a higher market-rate facility will expect adequate parking, and if it's not provided, the apartment owner will hear about it, Wood continued.

"It's going to regulate itself," he said.

He added the apartments constructed adjacent to Sam Peden Community Park were also approved with a parking unit ration of just more than one-to-one per unit, and that the proposed development downtown is in a more pedestrian-friendly environment.

AT&T, which has a location across from the development, donated a 24-space lot to the city to be utilizes specifically for the development.

Flaherty and Collins — which had initially announced a $16 million project before additional features were added bringing the cost to $26 million — also has plans for a 1,600 square foot retail space on the site.

It will likely be occupied by a coffee shop or small restaurant, and would only require eight spaces under city ordinance, representatives with the development team said.

The New Albany City Council approved in July a financing package that will allow Flaherty and Collins to payoff up to $4.9 million in debt for the development utilizing tax dollars earned through the project. The developer will be allowed to use tax-increment financing, or TIF, funds raised through the increased property values from the site to pay back the debt.

The New Albany Redevelopment Commission voted to include the Coyle property in a TIF district prior to the bond vote by the council.

So, if Breakwater residents park across Spring Street amid one of the most poorly maintained corporate structures in the city, the most direct path to their cars does not involve walking one or two blocks east or west, then doubling back, but heading right across the street -- a street recently rebuilt without crosswalks in this spot.

But didn't we just vanquish one-way streets for the stated purpose (among others) of eliminating unnecessary "round the block" trips for drivers?

What about walkers?

Moreover, shouldn't the stop light (or four-way stop) be at 8th Street, not 7th, and shouldn't there be an "enhanced" (hint: enforced) crosswalk opposite Breakwater?

Mark my words: two-way calming effects aside, vehicular speed once again will become an issue on Spring Street from 15th to 7th, and from 7th to 4th, and as high speeds pertains to the latter, it will be on a stretch of street running between 200 - 300 apartment residents and the most direct route both to parking and downtown amenities.

It makes very little sense, though it probably testifies to Jeff Gahan's befuddled desire to do the impossible by making the city walkable without inconveniencing drivers.

---

Previously:

Grid Control, Vol. 24: Deliver me this.

Grid Control, Vol. 23: City's fuddy-duddies losing their minds as the debut for a two-way Spring Street is pegged at August 29.

Grid Control, Vol. 22: City engineer Larry Summers answers our questions about intersection striping errors and the "No Trucks" sign removal.

Grid Control, Vol. 21: Murderous intersection at Spring & 10th to be repaved and restriped -- and, the hocus-pocus with a disappearing "No Trucks" sign at Spring & Vincennes.

Grid Control, Vol. 20: As Team Gahan dawdles, another bicyclist is crushed into mincemeat at 10th & Spring's dangerous dogleg.

Grid Control, Vol. 19: In a positive move, HWC begins righting the wrong cross hatching on Spring Street.

Grid Control, Vol. 18: Finally a few BoW street grid project answers, almost all of them citing "contractor error."

Grid Control, Vol. 17: Judging by the misdirection of this "CROSS TRAFFIC DOES NOT STOP" sign, we now reside in the British Empire.

Grid Control, Vol. 16: What about HWC's cross hatching correction? Will this be finished before or after Team Gahan declares victory?

Grid Control, Vol. 15: Dooring enhancement perfectly epitomizes Deaf Gahan's "biking last" approach to grid modernization.

Grid Control, Vol. 14: Yes, you can still park on the south side of Spring Street during the stalled two-way grid project.

Grid Control, Vol. 13: "Dear Deaf Gahan and minions: FOR THE LOVE OF PETE, STOP TRYING TO BE COOL AND DESIGNER-ISH. YOU'RE NOT, AND IT'S EMBARRASSING ALL OF US."

Grid Control, Vol. 12: Meet the artistic crosswalk design equivalent of dogs playing poker.

Grid Control, Vol. 11: HWC Engineering meets with St. Marks, city officials nowhere to be found.

Grid Control, Vol. 10: City officials predictably AWOL as HWC Engineering falls on its sword over striping errors.

Grid Control, Vol. 9: "This was supposed to be discussed with us," but Dear Leader doesn't ever discuss, does he?

Grid Control, Vol. 8: City Hall characteristically mum as HWC Engineering at least tries to answer the cross-hatching question.

Grid Control, Vol. 7: What will the Board of Works do to rectify HWC's striping errors on the north side of Spring Street, apart from microwaving another round of sausage biscuits?

Grid Control, Vol. 6: Jeff Speck tweets about NA's grid changes, and those missed bicycling opportunities.

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

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.

ASK THE BORED: Tucson's first rainbow crosswalk -- and we get stuck with dozens of lousy anchors enabled by municipal cowardice.

Yes, those bright rainbow colors are far more cheering than the sad visages of the bureaucrats.

Crosswalks are likely to be a theme this morning when the bored of works convenes to ensure that New Albany's built environment rigorously conforms to the mayor's barren and denuded inner artistic vision.

Last evening at the city council meeting, councilman Greg Phipps observed that the solar-powered, button-activated yellow caution lights at the shiny new anchor-laded crosswalk at Main and W. 1st actually do very little to slow thundering auto-centric herds.

CM David Barksdale added that in his experience, the flashing lights not only fail to make an impression on drivers far too busy checking their iPhones, but also taper off too quickly once daring walkers have waded into the street.

Allow me to add that if solar-activated yellow flashing lights do not convince drivers to yield to pedestrians, soon-to-be ubiquitous sharrow symbols painted on streets do not convince drivers to share space with bicyclists.

In fact, the modern-day sharrow is a symbol of civic cowardice, as is the reluctance of Team Gahan to institute measures that might actually slow traffic and make streets safe for all users.

Simply stated, using $3 million of the federal government's money to complete a grid modernization program is not, in and of itself, the solution. It isn't victory. Rather, it's a beginning.

Last week, city engineer Larry Summers insisted that the speeding problem at Main and 10th dogleg -- future site of another solar-enhanced crosswalk-- could be corrected without need of a stop light or four-way stop, when Occam's razor suggests the simplest answer to be the best: just stop traffic there with a light or sign.

Spring Street is not a highway. It is a street in a heavily populated urban area, and until Team Gahan's functionaries can wrap themselves around this concept, these failures in imagination will continue.

Also, given the council's new and improved anti-littering ordinance and fine structure, shouldn't BoW finally take seriously the notion of walkability-oriented garbage cans?

Should't their be a garbage can at every streetside bench and crosswalk?

Doesn't the fact that downtown garbage cans constantly overflow indicate (a) people will use them, and (b) they need to be emptied more often?

We close today with this thought about the grid "modernization" project's utter failure to make good on the promise of Jeff Speck's recommendations, as written by the junior editor, Jeff Gillenwater.

Now that they've cut the grooves for the lines on Market Street, you can finally get quite a nice view of all the wasted space. Coming out of downtown from west to east, they clearly made the parking lanes a couple feet wider than needed on both sides of the street in order to fill the void where Jeff Speck's group had originally planned a bi-directional bicycle track. Then, at 13th Street, bike lanes connected to nothing magically appear. By the time they're finished with neighborhood streets around here, they'll have spent $5 - $6 million doing what they could have done much, much better for less than half. It's really no wonder they worked so hard to keep the plan a secret. New Albany city government: all idiocy, all the time.

Not in NA, at least yet: "Man In Wheelchair Struck By Car, Gets Ticket For Not Crossing Road Fast Enough."

Our weekend message to "Mayor Jeff Gahan Presents the Board of Public Works and Safety" (shouldn't it be Board of Works and Public Safety?) simply is this.

Don't be like Denver (below) -- and don't lie to me by saying "it couldn't happen here."

The mayor and his board have made no effort whatever to wrap their institutional arms around modernity. To repeat: it's merely procedural, Jeffrey and Warren. You must develop good habits, and to develop them, you must acknowledge you have a problem.

Instead of this: "How will (a proposal) affect parking/traffic/cars?"

You ask this: "How will (a proposal) affect handicapped users without cars?"

Infrastructure decisions routinely are rendered in the absence of forethought as to their effects on persons with disabilities. These tiny bits of effort will have little if any ultimate effect on the Holy Writ of Autocentrism. However, these instances will immeasurably assist the disabled in getting back and forth.

It's cultural, Jeffrey and Warren. You're in charge. Think you might get to the task of changing the culture?

Or should we ask Adam's DemoDisneyDixiecratic Party for permission?

online.com/2017/08/01/man-in-wheelchair-struck-by-car-gets-ticket-for-not-crossing-road-fast-enough/amp/">
Man In Wheelchair Struck By Car, Gets Ticket For Not Crossing Road Fast Enough (5 News Online)

DENVER -- A man in a wheelchair claims he was ticketed because he couldn't get across the road during the signal's allotted time and now he's fighting the citation, according to KDVR.

Kyle Wolfe said he was passing through 19th and Lawrence streets in downtown Denver. Wolfe said he started to cross the street when the signal indicated it was his turn to cross.

Wolfe said he couldn't make it through the intersection in the 20 seconds allotted at the light. He said he was 5 feet from the curb when an SUV struck him from behind.

Wolfe said the accident left his wheelchair totaled, and left him scraped and bruised. He received a ticket from a Denver police officer for disobeying the traffic signal.

"I was very shocked that a pedestrian that has the right of way got a ticket," Wolfe said.

"Congratulations, Honolulu, for battling a surge in pedestrian deaths by punishing prospective victims."

The following words summarize the scandal-plagued Gahan administration's approach (more accurately, its absence) in using Jeff Speck's street study as a blueprint for "grid modernization," or, the project that dare not mention "two-way streets" publicly.

If it bikes, blame it.
If it walks, marginalize it.
If it drives, subsidize it.
-- Attributed to Dan Kostelec

In Honolulu's case, walkers have graduated from marginalization to blame, though not unexpectedly, research doesn't support the notion that pedestrian cellphones are the problem.

Rather, it's just another way of cosseting subsidized drivers.

The Problem With Honolulu's New Ban on Texting in Crosswalks, by Laura Bliss (CityLab)

Elderly pedestrians die at a higher rate in Honolulu than anywhere else. Their cellphones aren’t the issue.

 ... Pedestrians can obviously insert themselves into dangerous situations by ignoring signals and walking into traffic—and they share responsibility in plenty of crashes. Using a cell phone while crossing the street can be a hazard, sure. Inherently dangerous to others, however, it is not.

Driving is. So are many of the streets designed to support it. And using a phone in the driver’s seat dramatically increases the chance of a crash. As the economy recovers, more cars are on the road, driving more miles—which translates to that many more people texting and chatting while navigating their two-ton steel boxes. The recent rash of pedestrian fatalities is not all that surprising.

And:

The city’s overall rate of pedestrian deaths is on par with the national average; so is the state’s. Elderly folks also have a harder time recovering from traumatic injuries, and Hawaii’s 65-plus-set are considerably more active than their mainland counterparts. Older Honolulans die on the streets at a high rate not because they’re consumed by their cell phones, but, largely, because there are more of them navigating car-centric roads.

All hail New Gahanian crosswalk puddle-a-bility: Brand new asphalt, concrete and ramps, and the same old non-drainage problem.

And the road goes on forever ...

ASK THE BORED: Mayor Jeff M. Gahan presents BOW presenting exciting new vistas in sidewalk blockage.

Just monetize, baby: Mirror imagery at Main & W. 1st.

In New Gahania, first we look at the purse.

Mark of Duggins: "An anchor fixes a potentially moving object to a place. It gets stuck in the mud and silt and keeps things from moving. That's why it's called an anchor."

W. 1st crosswalk propaganda: Other cities allow artists to create art. Ours merely glorifies its own fix-is-in muddy anchor.

W. 1st crosswalk propaganda: Other cities allow artists to create art. Ours merely glorifies its own fix-is-in muddy anchor.

The good news: The crosswalk the city denied was possible is almost completed.

The bad news: Nothing prepares you for the public propaganda installation on W. 1st.

Anybody got a bucket?

ASK THE BORED: Anti-climactic paving bids, Elm Street speedway work and the forthcoming W. 1st and Main intersection.

ASK THE BORED: A progress report on paving, two-way streets and the crosswalk on Main at W. 1st.

ASK THE BORED: It's a pretty penny, but safety for humans at the intersection of Main and W. 1st draws nearer.

ASK THE BORED: Anti-climactic paving bids, Elm Street speedway work and the forthcoming W. 1st and Main intersection.

The minutes from May 23 are in, and the low bid for this season's citywide paving extravaganza ... like always ...

MAC! MAC! MAC!

No word on the inevitable re-dos, do-overs, or other famous stuffed-envelope-driven hallmarks of beak wetting borne of annual paving -- but guys, low bid!

Meanwhile, two other items about grid modernization (i.e., paving) and the W. 1st and Main work.

Elm Street paving begins now. There'll be a second street where average traffic speeds increase by 15% prior to the two-way restriping.

Finally, the quarter-million dollar W. 1st Street and Main Street Crosswalk project, photos of which follow, draws nearer to completion.

For a reprise of the long exhausting march toward a human-friendly intersection, with Team Gahan resisting every step, consult this popular previous post.

ASK THE BORED: It's a pretty penny, but safety for humans at the intersection of Main and W. 1st draws nearer.

This is welcome news, and takes on added importance given the resistance with which City Hall initially greeted the idea. I'll never forget being informed in detail as to the absolute impossibility of such a human-friendly notion -- although negotiating with INDOT to ensure 2015 election-year street paving on Main rather than substantive dialogue about safety proved to be a very do-able priority.

They do excel at certain things.

ASK THE BORED: A progress report on paving, two-way streets and the crosswalk on Main at W. 1st.

From the BOW meeting of May 16, in their own words, an update on downtown grid paving and the crosswalk project at Main and W. 1st.

---

A MEETING OF THE BOARD OF PUBLIC WORKS & SAFETY OF THE CIVIL CITY OF NEW ALBANY, INDIANA, WAS HELD IN THE THIRD FLOOR ASSEMBLY ROOM AT THE CITY/COUNTY BUILDING ON TUESDAY, MAY 16, 2017 AT 10:00 A.M.

PRESENT: Mickey Thompson, member, Cheryl Cotner-Bailey, member, and Warren V. Nash, president. 

OTHERS PRESENT: Fire Chief Juliot, Fire Marshal Koehler, Mike Hall, Sandy Boofter, Chris Gardner, Bryan Slade, Sidney Main, Larry Summers, David Hall, Jessica Campbell, Police Chief Bailey, Alicia Meredith, Courtney Lewis and Mindy Milburn

(excerpt follows)

Sunny Dickerson, HWC Engineering, reported on the progress of the two-way conversion. He explained that the underground conduit is in on Spring Street as well as the pit bores for the detector houses. He stated that they are starting on Elm Street today and they should be done with that by the end of the week. He added that the work will be contingent upon MAC completing their paving work but as of right now everything looks to be on schedule.

Wes Christmas explained that the south side of the milling is completed and they are already working on the north side, so it should be completed today. He stated that there may be a few side streets that need to be finished but they plan to start paving tomorrow. He explained that the plan is to have all the paving work completed by Thursday and Friday if the weather cooperates. He stated next week is an off week for paving activities while they wrap up the underground work, and the week of May 30th they will begin the same process on Elm Street.

Mr. Nash asked about the temporary markings that will be put out.

Mr. Christmas explained that it will be the same configuration as it is now and will not change until all the new signage and signals are complete.

Mr. Nash asked if Market would be done after Elm

Mr. Christmas replied yes and explained that all paving is anticipated to be complete before the end of June. He added that Police Chief Bailey suggested installing additional signage to let the residents and businesses know what is going on so they have small signs every 30 feet down the corridor as well as an additional message board.    

Mrs. Cotner-Bailey asked if they could have door hangers.

Mr. Christmas explained that they haven’t done it in the past but they could check on that if they need to.

Mr. Nash asked if the signs have been working.

Police Chief Bailey stated that there hasn’t been a tremendous problem and they have the few incidents under control. 

Mr. Summers asked Mr. Christmas to touch on the West 1^st and Main Street project.

Mr. Christmas explained that this is for the bump-outs and pedestrian crossings and the work is under way. He stated that the majority of the concrete is poured on the southeast corner and they started demo on the southwest corner. He explained that once the south side is done they will jump over the north side and do the other two corners. He added that beyond the intersection the only work that is being done is the addition of a few trees.

Mr. Nash commented that some of the trees on State Street look too big for the bump-outs.

Mr. Christmas stated that the trees were suggested by Greg Mills and are supposed to be of a smaller variety. 

ASK THE BORED: It's a pretty penny, but safety for humans at the intersection of Main and W. 1st draws nearer.

Three weeks ago, councilman David Barksdale confided that the Redevelopment Commission would be seeking bids at its March meeting (no minutes will be available until they're approved in April) for the crosswalk and "intersection improvements" at Main and West 1st.

This is welcome news, and takes on added importance given the resistance with which City Hall initially greeted the idea. I'll never forget being informed in detail as to the absolute impossibility of such a human-friendly notion -- although negotiating with INDOT to ensure 2015 election-year street paving on Main rather than substantive dialogue about safety proved to be a very do-able priority.

Thanks again to Barksdale and others who helped resolve the impasse, which as this excerpt from October, 2016 was facilitated by the Redevelopment Commission, not BOW.

Note that while Bob Caesar remains a hypocrite concerning the sanctity of budgets and expenditures, his question here is timely, and you're reading it right: $250,000 to get this done. Might it have cost less had the work been incorporated with "get out the vote" paving, rather than resisted by functionaries who hadn't yet bothered to read Jeff Speck's book?

Only Deaf Gahan knows for sure. Here's a repeat of the most recent summary of the long march toward safety at Main and W. 1st.

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November 8, 2016

ASK THE BORED: Red carpet pedestrian treatment for Hausfeldt Lane as the trucks roar past the corner of Main and W. 1st.

As a prelude to a discussion that occurred at last week's Bored Conclave, where the plume of white smoke indicates a pants leg on fire -- a meeting kept mercifully short so the political appointees could resume their partisan beak-wetting campaigns -- recall that NA Confidential has placed the topic of crosswalks and pedestrian safety on the front burner way for years.

Here is a sampling of links since 2014. Recently, we've placed the spotlight on the increasingly busy corner of Main and W. 1st, but there are multiple candidates for scrutiny throughout the city, most of them being ignored by the somnolent timer-servers in municipal government.

Must we wait for a traffic study to slow traffic and put crosswalks at the corner of Main and W. 1st?

Walkability might as well begin with the intersection of Main and West 1st, so can it begin now?

As Team Gahan snoozes, the intersection of West 1st and Main is an accident waiting to happen.

Two weekend posts about Team Gahan's arrogant auto-centrism.

Team Gahan's breathtaking passive/aggressive answer to the question of making a safe pedestrian crossing at Main and W. 1st.

ON THE AVENUES: Requiem for the bored.

There is no crosswalk at Main and W. 1st Streets, and yet there's one in the middle of the block by the hospital (2 of 2).

City engineer Larry Summers and INDOT explain why there is no crosswalk at Main and W. 1st Streets (1 of 2).

Dangerous intersections: Something for Greg Phipps to consider, though it's unlikely they will.

Back in June, thanks to the intervention of councilmen Barksdale and Knable (if memory serves), the art of the possible suddenly came to the attention of the snoring usual suspects.

A crosswalk at Main & W. 1st? One month ago it was utterly impossible, but now Redevelopment says anything's possible.

Taking all this into consideration, you'll understand why we're fascinated to learn of the following conversation at last week's Bored of Works gathering.

In short, on Hausfeldt Lane we'll sound alarms, construct non-standard guides and post a city employee to escort folks back and forth across a street made potentially dangerous by passing trucks, but at Main and W. 1st, with thriving businesses on all four corners, and the same dangerous trucks barreling back and forth, uncontrolled in terms of speed on a street too wide, the same argument will be deferred, and until recently ignored, by virtue of ineffectual gurgling sounds, at least until an elected official or two applies pressure and calls the city's perennial bluff.

Why is Team Gahan constantly contemptuous of pedestrians and cyclists?

Could it be, at least in part, that none of them know what it's like to walk?

ASK THE BORED: If the ramps were wrong, why aren't you making a slapdash contractor pay to redo them?

I'm not sorry at all that I missed the following disjointed ADA ramp replacement chat at last week's Bored of Works meeting.

BOW chairman Warren Nash listened as Wes "Usual Engineer" Christmas updated the board about ongoing ramp replacements downtown, apparently tied to last year's paving-to-campaign-finance funding effort, but now necessitated by stringent federal standards prior to the implementation of the bastardization of the Speck two-way street plan.

Nash was unable to ask clearly if these new ramps had only recently been redone. Rather, he said that there had been "some talk" of them being only recently redone.

Christmas parried with a predictable "not sure," but feinted in the crowd-pleasing direction of blaming the utility monopolies.

City engineer Larry Summers quickly deflected potential pointed fingers by testifying to the unvarying veracity of the ramp slant inventory.

Then Nash got a bit more specific: Now he understands that some of the ramps were replaced only 2-3 years ago, so why would they need to be replaced again?

Summers and Christmas agreed that no matter when the ramps were last replaced, they must be replaced again, because that's the way things work when you're sucking campaign finance garnish from the feds.

The conversation ended there. Now, dear reader, can you formulate the questions you'd ask if you'd been in the room last week, and were allowed to query?

Something like this to start ...

"YOU ARE THE CHAIRMAN OF THE BOARD, AND HAVE BEEN FOR FIVE YEARS, AND NOTHING LIKE THESE RAMPS IS ALLOWED TO HAPPEN WITHOUT THE BOARD'S APPROVAL, SO RATHER THAN ASK BEFUDDLED QUESTIONS ABOUT WHEN AND HOW IT HAPPENED, DO YOU THINK JUST MAYBE YOU MIGHT LOOK BACK INTO YOUR OWN BOARD'S RECORDS AND FIND THE ANSWER?

And then the follow-up ...

"BECAUSE, IF UTILITY CONTRACTORS DID THE RAMPS WRONG, OR IF PAVING CONTRACTORS DID THEM WRONG, THEN SHOULDN'T THESE CONTRACTORS BE HELD RESPONSIBLE FOR WHAT THEY BOTCHED?" 

The latter is the question most ordinary people would ask, and we have no answer for it. There'll be another weekly BOW meeting today. Rinse, and repeat.

ASK THE BORED: Had NA Confidential not asked, it's unlikely City Hall would have answered, so "Initial Work on Grid Modernization Begins."

Hell, it took NAC two weeks to ask, but at least we got around to it on the 24th.

ASK THE BORED: BOW directs handicapped sidewalk users into traffic lanes as downtown corner ramp replacements make a mockery of safety, but bolster campaign finance slush. Also, downtown RR crossing expenses.

None of this has to do with functionality, service to citizens, or even basic competence. It's purely a financial transfer scheme and Team Gahan is making the previous two mayors look like rank amateurs.

It shouldn't come as a surprise that someone had to prod before City Hall felt the need to answer. In New Albany, "proactive" means that 5% of the 80% tithed by the federal government has been safely installed in its comfortable new Cayman Islands home. After this cardinal rule is obeyed, coin flips are sufficient for future information dissemination.

And so they answered with a sleek press release on the 27th. It's called "cause and effect." Of course, it might have been better for City Hall to explain what was happening when the blasting caps first began igniting, but ... see the definition of "proactive" above.

Initial Work on Grid Modernization Begins

Initial work on the Grid Modernization Project, which will transform New Albany’s downtown grid from a 1-way traffic system to 2-way streets, has begun.

Two initial steps have been taken to start the process:

1. All non-American with Disabilities Act compliant ramps in the downtown grid system are currently being updated to provide connectivity and access for all that use our downtown sidewalks.

Working from an inventory that was recently completed by local engineering firm Jacobi, Toombs, & Lanz, Inc., crews have been working since early January on bringing these important infrastructure items up to code. While the largest number of updated ramps are mostly limited to Spring, Market, and Elm streets, side streets with non-compliant ramps are being updated as well. This initial work is expected to be completed by the end of February.

2. Bumpouts on the north side of Market Street are being reconfigured beginning Monday, January 30th.

The bumpouts along the north side of Market Street are being reconfigured in preparation of 2-way traffic along Market Street. By having these bumpouts re-aligned, the city will be able to retain the same number of parking spaces along this corridor when the conversion to 2-way streets is made. During the construction, an estimated 6 parking spaces will be unavailable until the full conversion is made. However, once the 2-way street conversion is complete, all current parking spaces are expected to return.

Future schedule for the Grid Modernization Project

Milling and paving of the downtown grid will begin shortly after asphalt plants reopen in Spring 2017. The project will then begin the installation of a new signalization system, along with accessible pedestrian facilities at each signalized crossings. The contractual completion date for the entire 2-way conversion is September 30, 2017.

If 2017 really is to be the year when the Downtown Grid Modernization Project transitions from the mere rumor of a long overdue, messy compromise of a typically botched Gahanesque half-ass measure, to these adulterated facets actually appearing in real life, then City Hall's favored minions at HWC Engineering, now safely ensconced in the same building as the sewer utility, making those dreamy stuffed satchel transfers easier than ever before -- though it isn't clear which way the largess is traveling -- should have long since moved past the stage of ensuring campaign finance rivulets flowing downhill like raging storm water from Summit Springs, straight into the mayor's splendid State Senate coffers, and started the task of rendering our splendid Speck into adulterated sausage.

So they have. By September 30, we'll see just how badly they've botched it.