Category: walkability

prudent vs. irresponsible drivers

Dan AllisonLeave a comment

The previous post was about prudent drivers. The table below shows how I think of prudent drivers, and irresponsible drivers. It is so hard to not be snarky about driver behavior, but I have toned it down quite a bit. If you think I am exaggerating, then you don’t spend much time on the roads walking and bicycling. I spend a lot of time doing both, probably averaging three hours per day, all of it closely observing driver behavior and the roadway built environment, because it is both my job and my advocacy. The irresponsible behavior is something I see every day, from a significant percentage of drivers. Notice that I did not use the term negligent driver, as is the legal term in my prior post on a prudent driver, because only some of this is negligent; much of it is just sociopathic.

Prudent Driver Irresponsible Driver
yields to pedestrians in crosswalks and waiting to cross never yields to pedestrians
takes turn at stop sign intersections goes out of turn at stop sign intersections
obeys speed limits, within 5 mph drives as fast as possible in all situations
on multi-lane roads, always slows or stops if a vehicle in another lane is stopped on multi-lane roads, pulls around other vehicles that are stopped, honks, and proceeds at full speed
rarely uses their car horn, and only to prevent a crash often uses their car horn to make those other idiots pay attention and get out of the way
is aware of what is going on around them is focused on other things than the road
doesn’t use their smart phone while driving, other than wayfinding holds ongoing conversation on smart phone; texts when they think they can get away with it
passes bicyclists with a safe distance, even when it means waiting yells at, honks at, and close-passes bicyclists, because they don’t belong on the road
believes all people have a right to share the public space on the roadway believes that right to the roadway is determined by the value of their vehicle and social status
will do anything to avoid a crash revels in crashes when they know they are right
knows the the cost of building and maintaining roads is subsidized by everyone is certain that gas tax monies are being illegally diverted to other uses
knows that parking is never ‘free’ and someone, or all of us, are paying believes that the right to free parking is guaranteed in the constitution, and that the parking space in front of their house belongs to them
could be a male or female (or non-binary) is almost always a male

a prudent driver

Dan Allison1 Comment

700. Basic Standard of Care: A person must use reasonable care in driving a vehicle. Drivers must keep a lookout for pedestrians, obstacles, and other vehicles. They must also control the speed and movement of their vehicles. The failure to use reasonable care in driving a vehicle is negligence.

Judicial Council of California Civil Jury Instructions, 2019

The term ‘prudent driver’ does not exist in law or case law for California, though it does for some other states. The concept is useful enough that I’d like to explore it here. The term is closely related to other concepts such as a ‘reasonable person’, ‘prudent man‘, ‘prudent person’, ‘duty of care’, and ‘standard of care’. The Judicial Council of California Civil Jury Instructions (CACI) document, excerpted above, is often referred to a ‘case law’, instructions for how to interpret legal codes, based on court findings. Many terms in California Vehicle Code are left intentionally fuzzy, but case law removes much of, but not all of, this fuzziness. In civil law, which is what this document covers, the three criteria for establishing liability are negligence, causation, and harm, meaning that the person acted in a negligent way, and harm was caused by the negligence.

Of the two issues most relevant to people walking, speeding and failure to yield are the most significant.

706. Basic Speed Law (Veh. Code, § 22350): A person must drive at a reasonable speed. Whether a particular speed is reasonable depends on the circumstances such as traffic, weather, visibility, and road conditions. Drivers must not drive so fast that they create a danger to people or property.

Judicial Council of California Civil Jury Instructions, 2019

Section 706: Basic Speed Law (and sections 707 and 708), presents the idea that violation of the speed limit is not, per se, evidence of negligence on the part of the driver, but that the test is whether the speed was reasonable. In most European countries, violation of speed limits is negligence, but unfortunately that is not the case in the US. But the document does lay out pretty clearly that the driver is responsible for controlling their vehicle and anticipating the presence of other users on the roadway.

710. Duties of Care for Pedestrians and Drivers in Crosswalk (Veh. Code, § 21950): A driver of a vehicle must yield the right-of-way to a pedestrian who is crossing the roadway within any marked crosswalk or within any unmarked crosswalk at an intersection. When approaching a pedestrian who is within any marked or unmarked crosswalk, a driver must use reasonable care and must reduce his or her speed or take any other action necessary to ensure the safety of the pedestrian.

A pedestrian must also use reasonable care for his or her own safety. A pedestrian may not suddenly leave a curb or other place of safety and walk or run into the path of a vehicle that is so close as to constitute an immediate hazard. A pedestrian also must not unnecessarily stop or delay traffic while in a marked or unmarked crosswalk.

The failure of a pedestrian to exercise reasonable care does not relieve a driver of a vehicle from the duty of exercising reasonable care for the safety of any pedestrian within any marked crosswalk or within any unmarked crosswalk at an intersection.

Judicial Council of California Civil Jury Instructions, 2019

Section 710 covers the failure to yield to pedestrians violation, CVC 21950. The case law does have some interesting quotes:

“While it is the duty of both the driver of a motor vehicle and a pedestrian, using a public roadway, to exercise ordinary care, that duty does not require necessarily the same amount of caution from each. The driver of a motor vehicle, when ordinarily careful, will be alertly conscious of the fact that he is in charge of a machine capable of projecting into serious consequences any negligence of his own. […]”

“It is undisputed that defendant did not yield the right of way to plaintiff. Such failure constitutes a violation of the statute and negligence as a matter of law in the absence of reasonable explanation for defendant’s conduct.”

To summarize, my interpretation of the judicial guidance is:

  1. Drivers must control the speed of their vehicle, no matter what the posted speed limit, in recognition that they must always be aware of other users of the roadway and take all reasonable precautions to ensure that crashes do not occur.
  2. Drivers must yield to pedestrians who are exercising reasonable care in crossing the street, and the pedestrian has a presumption of right-of-way in the absence of other evidence.

So, a prudent driver would not be negligent, and a negligent driver would not be prudent.

Next post, more about how a prudent driver behaves.

the city could do this now

Dan AllisonLeave a comment

Some things the City of Sacramento could do today, and this week, to improve transportation and safety now and in the future:

  • Paint red curb offsets for all marked and unmarked crosswalks. These are upstream offsets, which have a strong safety value of increasing the visibility of drivers and walkers to each other. Downstream offsets, beyond the crosswalk, are much less important. Paint is cheap! Yes, maintenance of paint is more expensive, but this is important enough to make the investment.
  • Set all pedestrian signals to auto-recall, city-wide. Later we can have a discussion about whether to leave them this way, and how this interacts with the audible signals for limited vision people. I’m NOT saying disconnect the buttons, they would work if you pressed them, rather, that you no longer need to press them.
  • Convert the southbound light rail lane on 12th Street from a shared general purpose travel lane to a transit lane, from C Street to K Street. Having drivers interfere with light rail should never be OK. Consider doing the same for the portions of 7th Street and 8th Street where there is excess vehicle capacity.
  • Enforce, with a vengeance, speeding and failure to yield to pedestrian laws. Impound the cars and revoke the licenses of anyone who has more than one of these violations in a week. Our streets have been taken over by lawless joy-riders, and we need to take them back, for the safety of walkers, bicyclists, and other people in vehicles, and yes, people in adjacent buildings. Yes, these situations will end up in court, about whether the city has the power to do this, but in the meanwhile, we get these people off the street. This is an emergency, after all, and this seems a reasonable use of police emergency powers.
  • Close at least one street of at least a eighth mile length in every census tract. Since census tracts vary by population size, in a very rough way, this distributes the closed streets in the fairest manner. It provides people safe walking space in their neighborhoods, to ensure physical distancing.
  • Close the extra lanes on any street that has more than two lanes per direction, and re-allocate that space to either pedestrians or bicyclists, as demand seems to indicate.

There is construction going on right now on N Street adjacent to Capitol Park. The street has been narrowed from three lanes to one lane, and it is working just fine. The prudent driver, the one following speed limits, or at least in the range, now sets the speed of the roadway, and the egregious violators have to live with it. Which is, I think, why I’m not seeing problems on N Street right now, and am still seeing it on other wide roadways.

What else would you recommend, actions that could take place almost immediately and would not cost much?

16th & E construction problems

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An new housing development at 16th Street and E Street (remember, I’m not against housing developments) has significant problems. At the southeast corner of 16th and E, the corner has been completely blocked by construction barriers and fencing, so there is no safe wait space for people using the crosswalk, and therefore both crosswalks should be closed. There should be a barrier and signing on the east side crosswalk over E Street, and there should be a barrier and signing for the south side crosswalk over 16th Street. Neither are there.

16th Street & E Street, no crosswalk barrier

The project also has problems on 16th Street approaching from the south, where the sidewalk end, but a small sidewalk closed sign is not visible because it is on a canted fence, and there is no advance warning at F Street.

16th Street northbound, no visible signing

On E Street westbound, there is a construction fence with no sidewalk closed signing, nor is there any advanced signing at the last safe crossing at 17th Street.

E Street westbound, no signing

This property and development is apparently owned by SKK Development, Sotiris Kolokotronis, and is called Eleanor Apartments.

closed sidewalk & dead project at 700 16th

Dan Allison4 Comments

The apparently dead redevelopment project at 700 16th Street, the old Clarion Hotel, which occupies the block between 16th and 15th, and H Street and Government Alley, has closed sidewalks for a long period of time, even though nothing is happening there. The sidewalks closed are on H Street, the entire block, and 15th Street, the half block. As seen in the first photo below, there is enough pedestrian traffic on 15th Street to have worn a path in the sidewalk buffer. The solution here is to require the developer to remove this fence. If fencing is needed, which is doubtful on this side of the building, it should be on the property and not in the buffer. Re-opening this piece of sidewalk until such time as there is active development is the right thing to do.

15th Street use path, north of H Street, old Clarion Hotel

On the northwest corner of 15th Street and H Street, the corner could have been left open so that the two crosswalks could be safely used, but it was not. Instead, a sloppy fencing job leaves a sidewalk too narrow for ADA use.

15th Street & H Street, northeast corner, no ADA access for crosswalks

The sidewalk closure on H Street might need to remain because there is building access on this side, but it should be properly signed approaching from the east, which is is not.

H Street & 16th Street no signing

Lastly, on 15th Street southbound at Government Alley, there is a fence but no signing, and there is no advance warning at G Street that the sidewalk is closed ahead.

15th Street at Government Alley, no signing

This property is apparently owned by SKK Development, Sotiris Kolokotronis, and is called The Bernice. This failure to accommodate walkers is both the fault of the owner/developer, for the poor job of fencing and signing, and of the city for failing to monitor the situation (and perhaps for allowing it to exist in the first place). This also points out that there must be bonds for construction zone fencing and signing so that if a owner/developer fails to proceed with development, the city can go in and partially or fully restore access at the developer’s expense.

Sac permanently closes sidewalk

Dan Allison4 Comments

Note: updated 2020-03-28 to correct lane descriptions and add a photo of the lane shift.

On the south side of I Street, between 15th Street and 16th Street, the city has permanently closed the sidewalk. This was to construct a loading dock for Memorial Auditorium. I had noticed the construction going on there, the first phase of the city’s project for the convention center and community center theater, and just assumed things would be returned to normal when construction was complete. How wrong I was. I was flabbergasted when I saw this. The loading dock sticks quite a ways into what used to be the public right of way, erasing the sidewalk and two parking lanes (the general purpose lanes were shifted to the right). The loading dock is concrete, intended to be there forever. See the photos below.

If the loading area was really than important, and could not be provided anywhere else, the city could have set things up for easy temporary closure of some of the street so as to allow loading when needed. They did not, they made it permanent.

I have walked by here, on the sidewalk, when events were going on at the Memorial Auditorium and there were a lot of walkers using this sidewalk. I imagine for a lot of other uses as well.

Also note that the ‘ bike lane’ stripe does not meet standards for a bike lane because it is immediately adjacent to a hard barrier and fence, so requires shy distance not provided. So that means when there are eventually bike lanes on I Street, this will be a gap, permanently.

What the fuck were you thinking, City of Sacramento?

photo: I Street, south side, east of 15th Street
I Street, south side, east of 15th Street
photo: I Street, south side, east of 15th Street
I Street, south side, east of 15th Street
photo: I Street, south side, west of 16th Street
I Street, south side, west of 16th Street
photo: I Street, south side, west of 16th Street
I Street, south side, west of 16th Street
I Street westbound, lanes shifted right

10-minute walk to parks

Dan Allison1 Comment

There is a national movement, 10 Minute Walk, with a goal of every person in cities of all sizes is within a 10-minute walk to a park, by 2050.

In the Sacramento region, the City of Sacramento (Darrell Steinberg), the City of Elk Grove (Steve Ly), and the City of Citrus Heights (Jeannie Bruins) have signed on. None of the other cities have. Looking at the listing for the western United States, all are cities except for Los Angeles County. I am not sure if park districts can sign on, but that might make some sense for Sacramento County which has a large number of separate park districts as well at Sacramento Regional Parks.

Why is this important right now? Many neighborhoods do not have sidewalks, so people out for physical and mental health must walk in the street. Sometimes that is OK, on very low traffic and low speed streets, but as you may have noticed, some drivers are using the empty roads as an opportunity to speed and driver recklessly, unconstrained by congestion. Even on streets that have sidewalks, they are often much too narrow (4 feet, 5 feet, occasionally 6 feet, rarely more; I am talking about neighborhoods were most people live; central business districts often have wide sidewalks but few residents) to share with the 6-foot physical distancing requirement. Parks are a great alternative. I am not talking about gathering in parks, which has been prohibited or strongly discouraged in most places, but just a safe and pleasant place to walk. Though many of us will be working to prevent a return to previous traffic levels and speeds, the mostly empty streets we are seeing now have a limited shelf life, and the need for parks will be even greater.

Though I’ve been aware of this goal for a while, I have not looked into it or gotten involved yet. As I have the chance, I will post more, perhaps a map of the city or county showing ten minute walk buffers around parks, and information about whether this goal is in the existing and updated general plans for the counties and cities in the region.

In the meanwhile, you might want to look at the National Recreation and Parks Association (NRPA) web page on 10 Minute Walk for some background information.

Enjoy your walks!

10 Minute Walk logo

construction zone solutions

Dan Allison1 Comment

So, now that I’ve spent several posts complaining, on to solutions. The city is working an ordinance for construction zone handling, but I have not seen any draft documents. When something is available, I’ll add it.

The City of Oakland has what is generally considered to be the model guidance (http://www2.oaklandnet.com/oakca1/groups/pwa/documents/memorandum/oak062315.pdf), though Seattle also has something good that I’ve not tracked down yet. Sacramento could do well to simply adopt the Oakland guidance, but it is pretty radical for Sacramento, so I’m expecting something weaker to come out. Let me say what I think is most important.

Let me credit Robert Prinz of Bike East Bay for publicizing the guidance (he may have also had a part in developing it, not sure about that), and for monitoring compliance and publicizing failures. He is an inspiration for me.

  1. Management:
    • Responsibility for approving traffic control plans should be removed from Construction Services and placed in another division of Public Works that will actually ensure quality traffic control plans and enforcement as needed. Construction Services has demonstrated that they cannot be trusted with this responsibility. They continually bias for motor vehicle traffic and drivers, and against walkers and bicyclists.
    • Construction sites should be inspected on a regular basis by city personnel, to ensure that they have correctly installed the signing and barriers specified in their approved traffic plan, and that these are maintained until completion of the project.
    • Fines will be imposed on construction companies that do not correct problems within 12 hours of reporting to the city, by city staff or by citizens. If the construction company fails to correct the issue within 48 hours, the construction project should be shut down.
  2. Sidewalks and bike lanes:
    • For any roadway with more than one general purpose travel lane in the same direction, it shall be automatic that temporary sidewalks and bicycle lanes will be placed instead one lane.
    • For any roadway with parking lane on the same side as the construction zone, it shall be automatic that temporary sidewalks and bicycle lanes will be placed in the parking lane.
    • For any roadway where the bicyclist and/or pedestrian traffic is above a certain level (I’m not sure what the number should be), if no accommodation can be made by using a parking lane or general purpose travel lane, then the road will be closed to motor vehicle traffic in one or both directions for the duration of the project.
  3. Crosswalks:
    • ADA compliant barriers and signing will be used at ALL construction projects which close a crosswalk, no matter what the duration of the project. For any closure of over a week, fixed metal barriers should be used (see photo below). Plastic barricade poles or construction tape will never be used by themselves to mark a closure.
    • Unless the closest safe crossing is clearly evident from the point of closure, wayfinding signs will be included specifying the shortest distance and safest crossing.
crosswalk closure barrier
ADA detectable crosswalk closure barrier

Signing off for now with the construction zone topic. I found several more problematic locations on my walk this morning, but I need to take mental break from this, and talk about other things.

As always, I invite your comments and additions. Stay safe walking and bicycling out there, but don’t stay home. Your sanity requires being outside, or at least that is my opinion.

This series of posts is available at https://gettingaroundsac.blog/tag/construction-zone/, and supporting photos at https://www.flickr.com/photos/allisondan/albums/72157713569318138.

walking…

Dan AllisonLeave a comment

A brief aside before I get to the solutions for construction zones.

I’ve been out walking
I don’t do that much talking these days
These days
These days I seem to think a lot
About the things that I forgot to do, for you
And all the times I had the chance to

Jackson Browne, “I’ve Been Out Walking” or “These Days” 1967/1973

I’ve realized in the last few days that I could spend a week, and fill up a week with blog posts, about construction zone problems in just the central city, and could probably spend a month on it in the entire city. Prior to the shelter-in-place, I was mostly bike riding for time reasons, but now that I have more time, I’ve been walking a lot more, and I see a lot of construction activity that I failed to notice on bike. When I’m bicycling, I just go around the construction zone, taking the lane, because that is what I mostly do anyway, and don’t think about it that much. However, most people aren’t willing to take the lane in traffic, and therefore are stopped cold by these construction zones that do not carry the bike lane through. My posts will continue to be mostly about issues for walkers because I see walkers as being more vulnerable users of the public right-of-way, as compared to bicyclists, and collision statistics back that up, however, I recognize that there are plenty of issues for bicyclists as well.

miscellaneous construction woes

Dan AllisonLeave a comment

I recognize that all the examples of construction zone problems (and a few done right) have been central city Sacramento. This is for two reasons, one is that I live downtown, and when I’m out on my physical distancing walks, these are the places I’m seeing. The second is that a lot of the construction happening in the entire city is happening in downtown, particularly the projects which require extensive closure of sidewalks, and bike lanes. If you have examples from other places, please let me know (allisondan52@gmail.com) and I will try to get there to take photos and analyze the situation. For those of you in the county, well, that is too much to tackle, and in a relative sense the county is economically moribund, so much less construction is going on.

Please don’t take my criticism of construction zones at being a criticism of construction. I love that there is a lot of construction going on. In midtown, most of the construction is housing, and nothing could make me happier. In downtown, there is more office construction than housing construction, and that is not a good thing, as it further exacerbates the jobs/housing imbalance in downtown. Except right around the arena, and in old town, there are few businesses and almost none are open on weekends because there is so little housing as compared to offices.

Below, a few last examples, before I move on to solutions. The first was a temporary issue, but it is illustrative of the problems. A mobile message board was placed in the center of the separated bikeway on 9th Street, even though there was a cross-hatched area immediately adjacent where is could have been placed, without constraining the bikeway or the general purpose lanes. I am not sure whose mistake this was, but anyone with a brain would know that this was the wrong place to put it. The sign was moved within a day of my reporting it to the city, but these are things that should be done right, not relying on citizens to correct mistakes.

9th Street separated bikeway, mobile message board

There is currently a utility project along the north side of L Street between 13th St and 10th Street. The photo belows shows the situation at L Street & 11th Street. The signing is acceptable, though the use of plastic barricade poles is not, but the issue is that the detour doesn’t tell you how far. A block? Several? Where is the nearest safe crossing? As referred to in the What? Cross Where? post, the west side of this intersection has a pedestrian prohibition, but you can see someone crossing here. And why not? What else could they do?

L Street at 11th Street, signing but no information, improper barricade

This next one was a temporary closure on 10th Street. There is signing, but rather than being placed at the point where a walker could either choose to cross to the east side of the street, or to walk through Cesar Chavez Plaza and back to the sidewalk, it was placed where the closure starts. Again, the plastic barricade poles do not meet ADA requirements because they are not detectable for person with vision limitations. While some would say, well this is just temporary, for a day, and standards should be lower, I disagree. It may be perfectly acceptable to not provide an alternative route for a temporary closure, but the signing and sign locations should be the same for all closures, whether they last an hour, a day, a week, a month, a year.

10th Street, west side, temporary closure

And one last example, though I have dozens more. The 3rd Street Sewer project has closed off 3rd Street from S Street to U Street. An attempt has been made to keep the sidewalks open, and I seriously appreciate this effort, as many construction projects would simply close off the sidewalks along with the street, and not think twice. However, construction tape does not a safe route make. The detour signs are clear, but no attempt is made to provide a detectable barrier. And construction tape…

3rd Street & T Street closure, signing, tape