Exclusive Pedestrian Phase Crosswalks

[mwb1848]

As pedestrian activity grows in Downtown El Paso, the city has implemented its first ever crosswalk that permits diagonal crossing at Santa Fe Street and Main Street. The signals have a 100% pedestrian cycle, allowing pedestrians to cross in any direction.

The city painted the full compliment of traffic markings as noted in the MUTCD:



...and supplemented with these signs:

[corco]

Boise has had one (and I believe only one!) for at least 18 years now. It's nice.

https://www.google.com/maps?q=boise+id&hl=en&ll=43.617139,-116.202027&spn=0.001552,0.002642&sll=46.593358,-112.015694&sspn=0.066648,0.169086&hnear=Boise,+Ada+County,+Idaho&t=h&z=19&layer=c&cbll=43.617139,-116.202027&panoid=Zni2S4ZKuzmsxtLTQ8DW2Q&cbp=12,64.59,,0,14.98

[Bruce]

So it's a pedestrian scramble?

Seattle has a few intersections with pedestrian-only cycles, but they restrict any crossings during the vehicular cycles.

[froggie]

DC uses the term "Barnes Dance", though they (to date) only have one, near the Verizon Center.

[wphiii]

Wow, judging from the posts here, these seem to be far rarer than I would have thought. Pittsburgh has had a number of them for as long as I can remember, though you have press a button to call for the pedestrian-only phase (it's not just part of the regular cycle). And we don't have the goofy pavement markings.

Biggest pet peeve is when someone presses the button when traffic isn't nearly heavy enough to require the all-walk phase so they end up going ahead and crossing anyway before the all-walk phase even comes on and then traffic has to sit there for an extra 30 seconds watching nobody cross the intersection.

[jakeroot]

Shibuya, Tokyo ... easily one of the most famous pedestrian scrambles.

CAUTION: Huge photo. Don't click w/o good internet.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/57/1_shibuya_crossing_2012.jpg

Turned IMG into URL because it was 14.5 MB, a killer for people browsing via mobile networks. - rmf67

[jeffandnicole]

Shibuya, Tokyo ... easily one of the most famous pedestrian scrambles.

CAUTION: Huge photo. Don't click w/o good internet.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/57/1_shibuya_crossing_2012.jpg

Look at all of those jaywalkers out of the stripped pedestrian area.

Turned IMG into URL because it was 14.5 MB, a killer for people browsing via mobile networks. - rmf67

[bzakharin]

This is the only one I can think of: https://www.google.com/maps/@39.939776,-75.0144,3a,75y,85.25h,82.18t/data=!3m4!1e1!3m2!1s7gwf2JXAwiYbiSv-BoA9NA!2e0!5m1!1e1

At my previous job, when our management from the UK visited, they were aghast that a pedestrian green was combined with a green light for any vehicular traffic at an intersection near our office building.

[Pete from Boston]

Lots of four-way walk phases  here, but no explicit diagonals to my knowledge.

[jakeroot]

At my previous job, when our management from the UK visited, they were aghast that a pedestrian green was combined with a green light for any vehicular traffic at an intersection near our office building.

I can't blame them. My job requires me to sit on a street corner in a downtown area (don't get any ideas). The amount of close calls I've seen....I would need 6 or 7 hands to count them all. Of course, the number of people actually hit is quite low (I only know of once, and it was my coworker and I was off-duty), which skews the stats to make most intersections appear safe (which, technically, they are, but close calls are no good). IMO, people shouldn't have to turn and expect pedestrians. I know that's how it's worked for decades, I just don't like it very much.

[cl94]

Toronto has a few, notably the one at Yonge and Dundas.

[Mr_Northside]

Biggest pet peeve is when someone presses the button when traffic isn't nearly heavy enough to require the all-walk phase so they end up going ahead and crossing anyway before the all-walk phase even comes on and then traffic has to sit there for an extra 30 seconds watching nobody cross the intersection.

I end up doing that occasionally, though when I press the button, I'm not sure if I'll have the opportunity to cross without the walk phase.  And yeah, there's no signage or special markings indicating permitted diagonal crossing, you just notice that all directions have "Walk" signs.

[cpzilliacus]

DC uses the term "Barnes Dance", though they (to date) only have one, near the Verizon Center.

There used to be a Barnes Dance in Silver Spring, Montgomery County, Maryland at Colesville Road (U.S. 29) and Fenton Street, but it has been gone for quite a few years now.

[dgolub]

They're pretty pervasive in New Haven, CT, where I went to college.  When I came home for breaks and was walking on Long Island, I always had to remind myself that diagonal crossings weren't possible there.

[thenetwork]

They used to have a 6-7 block slew of them in Norwalk, OH if you traveled down OH-61 (which is also the pre-bypass alignments of old US-20 and Old OH-18).  Every intersection in that stretch had them and it used to be that if you hit a red on the first instersection, you probably would hit red at another 2 intersections before getting out of the zone. 

I know I've seen a few out here in Colorado, but for the life of me I cannot remember where.

[theline]

There used to be one on the Ball State University campus, at McKinley and Riverside. It was known to all as the Scramble Light. At what was pretty much the center of campus in the 70s, it was a popular meeting place. "Meet me at the Scramble Light." It is long gone, as the campus sprawled over the years. I recall that the signal had a loud bell, like a traditional school bell, that sounded throughout the walk phase.

Here's a pretty good overview of the intersection, back in the day (as a bonus, the University Singers entertain): http://libx.bsu.edu/cdm/ref/collection/photo/id/15489

Although the diagonal is marked in only one direction, crossing was allowed in all directions. In other eras, the markings varied.

Here are more pictures of the scramble light area: http://libx.bsu.edu/cdm/search/collection/BSUAlmni!photo/searchterm/scramble%20light/order/nosort

[tdindy88]

The Scramble Light is still there. A few years ago they rebuilt the intersection and the streets around it but kept the Scramble Light as it was. Now there's a sound of a bird chirping (Ball State Cardinals after all) that signals it's okay to cross diagonally.

[english si]

https://www.google.com/maps/@51.515341,-0.141767,3a,75y,241.81h,71.16t/data=!3m4!1e1!3m2!1sjaBE1Khkox9ktYGu2y5mcw!2e0!5m1!1e1 Oxford Circus has diagonal crossings. The absence of pedestrians is because it must be very early morning.

Of course, there's no jaywalking rules in the UK, so that seems to exist to encourage tourists to cut across, rather than cross two sides.

[Duke87]

IMO, people shouldn't have to turn and expect pedestrians.

At some intersections in Midtown Manhattan (here's one example), NYCDOT has taken to adding delayed protected-only turns from streets onto avenues. The light turns green for traffic proceeding straight only, and the ped signals go to walk. Then the ped signal that conflicts with the turning movement flashes and goes to don't walk, and the red arrow turns green while straight traffic and the opposite crosswalk maintain a green until the end of the phase.

It's effective at reducing the number of motor vehicle/pedestrian conflicts since the bulk of crossing pedestrians will go right after traffic on the avenue gets a red light. But it doesn't eliminate all of them because in New York "don't walk" means "quickly check for crossing traffic, then run across through the first opening you see".

[rickmastfan67]

Shibuya, Tokyo ... easily one of the most famous pedestrian scrambles.

CAUTION: Huge photo. Don't click w/o good internet.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/57/1_shibuya_crossing_2012.jpg

Jake, while you gave people a suggestion to not click on the image, the problem is that since you put the URL for the full size image in the IMG tags, it loaded the full size 14.5 MB image anyways, even if you didn't click on it.  So, I had to turn the IMG into URL because it is a killer for people browsing via mobile networks.  And we have a lot of people visiting the forums that way now.

[jakeroot]

Shibuya, Tokyo ... easily one of the most famous pedestrian scrambles.

CAUTION: Huge photo. Don't click w/o good internet.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/57/1_shibuya_crossing_2012.jpg

Jake, while you gave people a suggestion to not click on the image, the problem is that since you put the URL for the full size image in the IMG tags, it loaded the full size 14.5 MB image anyways, even if you didn't click on it.  So, I had to turn the IMG into URL because it is a killer for people browsing via mobile networks.  And we have a lot of people visiting the forums that way now.

I meant to download the image myself, shrink it, and re-upload it since I noticed the page was starting to take a long time to load. Sorry m8.

[rickmastfan67]

Shibuya, Tokyo ... easily one of the most famous pedestrian scrambles.

CAUTION: Huge photo. Don't click w/o good internet.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/57/1_shibuya_crossing_2012.jpg

Jake, while you gave people a suggestion to not click on the image, the problem is that since you put the URL for the full size image in the IMG tags, it loaded the full size 14.5 MB image anyways, even if you didn't click on it.  So, I had to turn the IMG into URL because it is a killer for people browsing via mobile networks.  And we have a lot of people visiting the forums that way now.

I meant to download the image myself, shrink it, and re-upload it since I noticed the page was starting to take a long time to load. Sorry m8.

No problem man, it's all good.  Anyways, wikipedia usually has smaller versions of the images, didn't they have one for this one?

[Bruce]

Shibuya, Tokyo ... easily one of the most famous pedestrian scrambles.

CAUTION: Huge photo. Don't click w/o good internet.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/57/1_shibuya_crossing_2012.jpg

Jake, while you gave people a suggestion to not click on the image, the problem is that since you put the URL for the full size image in the IMG tags, it loaded the full size 14.5 MB image anyways, even if you didn't click on it.  So, I had to turn the IMG into URL because it is a killer for people browsing via mobile networks.  And we have a lot of people visiting the forums that way now.

I meant to download the image myself, shrink it, and re-upload it since I noticed the page was starting to take a long time to load. Sorry m8.

No problem man, it's all good.  Anyways, wikipedia usually has smaller versions of the images, didn't they have one for this one?

It's usually located right under the image, for example: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/57/1_shibuya_crossing_2012.jpg/1024px-1_shibuya_crossing_2012.jpg

[jakeroot]

Shibuya, Tokyo ... easily one of the most famous pedestrian scrambles.

CAUTION: Huge photo. Don't click w/o good internet.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/57/1_shibuya_crossing_2012.jpg

Jake, while you gave people a suggestion to not click on the image, the problem is that since you put the URL for the full size image in the IMG tags, it loaded the full size 14.5 MB image anyways, even if you didn't click on it.  So, I had to turn the IMG into URL because it is a killer for people browsing via mobile networks.  And we have a lot of people visiting the forums that way now.

I meant to download the image myself, shrink it, and re-upload it since I noticed the page was starting to take a long time to load. Sorry m8.

No problem man, it's all good.  Anyways, wikipedia usually has smaller versions of the images, didn't they have one for this one?

It's usually located right under the image, for example: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/57/1_shibuya_crossing_2012.jpg/1024px-1_shibuya_crossing_2012.jpg

Beyond me how I've never noticed that. Thanks guys!

[mrsman]

DC uses the term "Barnes Dance", though they (to date) only have one, near the Verizon Center.

There used to be a Barnes Dance in Silver Spring, Montgomery County, Maryland at Colesville Road (U.S. 29) and Fenton Street, but it has been gone for quite a few years now.

There is one in the Kemp Mill neighborhood at the corner of Arcola and Lamberton.  The intersection is suburban, but there is a synagogue on the corner where a lot of congregants are walking on Saturdays, especially around the time when the services end at approximately 11:30 a.m.

3 of the 4 corners have a permanent sign for "No turn on red".  The exit from the shopping center has "No turn on red" illuminated when the pedestrian light comes on.  There aren't any signs specifically permitting diagonal crossing, but many peds do it, since they know they have an exclusive phase where all traffic (including right turns) must stop.

The pedestrian phase is programmend as part of the regular traffic light cycle on Jewish Sabbath (Fri night - Sat night) and some Jewish holidays.  The pedestrian phase can also be activated by pushing a button during other times.