I suppose it's a better idea than paintball guns

Interesting traffic calming device being tested in Vancouver, BC, via ABC News:

The image of the phantom girl has been put onto a busy road near a West Vancouver, B.C., elementary school. It has been deemed "creepy" and "scary" by some bloggers and Internet posters and downright dangerous by a traffic expert, but a spokesman for the organization that designed speed bump stands by the effect.

"It's not meant to shock and alarm the driver," said David Dunne, director of Road Safety Strategy for the British Columbia Automobile Association. "It's meant to get the driver's attention."

Noted on the PAC 2 list last night, some concerns about whether the equipment installed on East Trinity to measure speeding on that road is in itself causing people to slow down, thereby skewing the data collected.

Here's an idea - if people are slowing down because they think they're being watched or recorded, then keep watching and recording them. They know they're driving too fast for the neighborhood and road conditions, they just don't give a shit because they assume there will be no consequences. Start creating consequences (ie - speeding tickets on a regular basis) and they'll start slowing down.

Continue reading I suppose it's a better idea than paintball guns

This made my day

From the folks at Triangle Business Journal, a searchable database of motor vehicle accident* locations in the Triangle between 2007 and 2009, based on data provided by NCDOT.

The database does not include information about injuries, fatalities, damages, etc., and appears to only include vehicle/vehicle interactions, not vehicle/pedestrian.

Here's the data for Roxboro St.

If you don't want to follow the link, here's some tidbits.

Club & Roxboro - 116
I-85 & Roxboro - 93
I-85 & Avondale - 63
Avondale & Foushee - 63
Avondale & Roxboro - 61
Roxboro & Roxboro - 24 (Yeah, i don't know where that is either.)
Avondale & Markham - 24
Markham & Roxboro - 20
I-85B & Roxboro - 17
I-85B & Avondale - 15
Avondale & Camden - 13
Avondale & Avondale - 10

If you're keeping track, that's a total of 519 reported motor vehicle accidents over a 3 year period, just in this section of the map. I chose it not only because i live pretty much in the middle of this mess, but because, around 4 or 5 years ago, NCDOT finished their "improvements" of the I-85 corridor, including "upgrades" to Roxboro and Avondale. (If you head further north up Roxboro, say as far as Infinity, add a couple of hundred more wrecks to the list at various intersections.) It's also the part of the city where i spend the most time on foot, with the least feeling of safety. Speed limits of 35 mph, already too high for residential & retail streets, are routinely ignored. 80th percentile speeds are well above 40, and speeds over 50 were clocked every hour of every day when we've had the radar counter out. A high speed of over 90 was recorded on Avondale near Camden a couple of years ago.

To put things in perspective, 3 of the top 4 intersections for wrecks in Durham County are on Roxboro St., and all 5 of the I-85 interchanges in town (Avondale, Roxboro, Duke, Geuss & Hillandale) make the top 20. Only 3 of the I-40 interchanges are in the top 20, despite I-40 carrying much more traffic than I-85, although I-40 and Fayetteville is the worst intersection in Durham in absolute numbers. I'd like to see the traffic volume counts for that intersection (138 collisions) compared to Club and Roxboro with 116 collisions. I suspect Fayetteville at 1-40 carries twice as many vehicles per day as Roxboro at Club/Foushee/I-85.

I wonder which of our city leaders has looked at the article, and what, if any, policy changes might come from this data? Better enforcement of traffic laws, perhaps? Some transit decisions to reduce the volume of traffic along the length of Roxboro to make it safer and more pedestrian friendly? Or just a shoulder shrug, same old same old, and hope for the best?

=====================
* I'm not a big fan of the term "accident" when it comes to motor vehicle collisions. Most of the time, there's something preventable that took place, whether it's speeding, driving while distracted, driving while impaired, or general stupidity behind the wheel of a 3000 pound machine moving at 40 mph or faster.

h/t to Durham/Orange Friends of Transit

Continue reading This made my day

Go Speed Racer, Go!

A Swedish man has been handed what is believed to be the world's largest speeding fine, which is expected to cost him £650,000.

The 37-year-old man was driving at two and a half times the speed limit in his £140,000 Mercedes when he was pulled over by traffic police in Switzerland.

They said he was traveling so fast it took him some distance to stop.

The motorist was traveling faster than any other person to be caught speeding in the country, according to prosecutors.

In Switzerland, speeding fines are calculated using a formula that takes into consideration on the income of the motorist and the severity of the speed.

The article goes on to note that most of the radar guns that the police have were not even capable of recording the actual speed of the car, which was eventually clocked at 186 mph. It doesn't say whether or not the driver grew up in Durham, but it does note that he claimed that typical North Carolina speeding excuse: "I think the speedo on the car, which is new, is faulty."

Continue reading Go Speed Racer, Go!

State Senator #23

From the Old North Durham neighborhood listserv:

How do you find out which NC State Senator owns license plate #23?? If you find out, please let me know. I'd love to send that Senator an angry email. If one of our local Senators, he won't get my vote any more either.

I was driving down Mangum Street on my way to work this morning. I pulled up behind a maroon Porsche Boxster with NC Senate plate #23 at Geer Street. When the light turned green, this car did a jack-rabbit start, accelerated to at least 50 mph, and drove down the center of Mangum straddling both lanes.

I was hoping to catch up to the car in downtown and give the driver a piece of my mind. However, I was going the speed limit and got stopped by the light at the Loop.

I don't care who you are or how important you think you are.....don't disrespect my neighborhood by driving recklessly!!!

I can't wait to let that Senator know what I think of their driving.

Jon
Edward Street

Hmmm. Now which state Senator has a "residence" in Old North Durham?
h/t to DS

Continue reading State Senator #23

PACE Car followup

Would have posted earlier this morning, but i spent an hour waiting for an Animal Control officer to come by and pick up the dog i found wandering on Rand Street in the rain this morning. Eventually had to leave and head for work, so no idea whether or not this guy is going to have to spend another day of his life neglected by his owners.


Anyway, to followup on the PACE Car announcement below. I've known for a couple of weeks that the program was being re-established, but was waiting for an official announcement. I guess an officer handing out magnets at a public meeting counts.

The website sign up form is not yet functional. To me, that's the first priority. Second priority is publicity. I can help, and any other bloggers and neighborhood folks who support this program can as well. Talk it up. All it is is a commitment to follow traffic laws when you're driving on city streets. Speed limits, stop signs, yielding to pedestrians, etc. The yellow magnet on the back of your car tells other drivers that's what you're doing.

Third priority is to make sure that every city owned vehicle sports one of these, and that the people driving them are instructed in following the traffic laws while they're behind the wheel of a city vehicle. When you're working for the city, and you're driving through town in a car that says "City of Durham" on it, you're an ambassador. You represent the city, so you may as well make people glad to see you.

My goal in this is to start changing the culture of driving, which privileges those behind the wheel at the expense of those walking, biking, in wheelchairs, or otherwise moving from place to place without a car. No doubt it will be a slow process. Before the program was allowed to lapse last year, it had almost reached the level where you would see multiple PACE car stickers on every trip around town. Shouldn't take more than a year to get back to that. If you see three or four cars with PACE car stickers on every trip to the mall, the dentist, the grocery store, the vet, or whatever, you'll start to figure out that people in Durham want you to slow down when you're behind the wheel.

And we do.

Continue reading PACE Car followup

Really good news

DPD Chief Jose Lopez was our guest at the neighborhood association meeting last night. While i was getting ready to harangue him on the speeding issue, Officer Bayne stopped by with a fresh supply of PACE Car magnets and an announcement that the program was being restarted.

Really good news. It seems like half the problem of dealing with unsafe streets has been getting DPD leadership to recognize that this is important. Fortunately, we weren't treated to the "other neighborhoods in Durham wish that speeding was their biggest problem" line that's been handed out on other occasions.

Probably helped that, of the 30 or so people in attendance, almost everyone raised their hand in response to the "have you had your house broken into in the past year" question. We know what our problems, and our priorities, are.

So, Officer Bayne, and everyone else at DPD who's working on this issue, thank you.

Continue reading Really good news

Potholes

Following up on yesterday's brief note about road paving and elections, i received an email from a friend yesterday entitled "Canadian speed control device."

While i doubt that's what's represented in the pictures (note the "Feels Like Pioneer Suspension" text overlaid on the photos), i think they would do the job of getting people to slow the fuck down on our neighborhood streets.




UPDATE: As i suspected.

Continue reading Potholes

20's plenty?

Via the bike and ped listserv, i learned about this UK campaign:

20's Plenty For Us was formed in order to campaign for the implementation of 20 mph as the default speed limit on residential roads in the UK.

Research has shown that the vast majority of the public would like 20 mph on residential roads. Recent changes in Dept of Transport guidelines have relaxed the recommendations and in many residential areas 20 mph limits may be set without any physical measures at all.

Portsmouth have taken the initiative and implemented a default 20 mph speed limit throughout their town in all except main arterial routes.

This site aims to provide the arguments for 20's Plenty in a coherent understood form with links to other material that shows how 20's Plenty saves lives and makes very little difference to actual journey times.

Whaddaya think? Any chance of something like that here? Hell, i'd settle for an enforced 30 mph limit on our residential thoroughfares like Roxboro & Alston. Too bad NCDOT is involved, though.

BTW - nice to see Durham police cars on I-85 monitoring traffic speeds. Would be nicer if they actually pulled people over at 75 in the 60 mph zone between exits 173 and 177. Yeah, i'm talking to you, Chevy Suburban, plate $WEL$PNT

Continue reading 20's plenty?

Oh, sorry, wasn't paying attention

Distracted driving is the subject of a two-day summit that the Department of Transportation kicked off today.

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood warned more than 200 attendees about the dangers of distracted driving and pledged to take action at the federal level to combat this "menace to society."

. . .

"We need a combination of strong laws, tough enforcement and ongoing public education to make a difference," he said. But "in reality, you can't legislate behavior . . . taking personal responsibility for our actions is the key for the solution."

But whatever approach is chosen, one is needed soon, say experts. In 2008, 5,870 traffic fatalities, 16% of all road deaths that year, occurred in crashes involving distraction, said Bruce Magladry, director of the Office of Highway Safety at the National Transportation Safety Board. In the year before, 12% of fatalities came from crashes involving distraction.

This data comes at a time when traffic fatalities are otherwise on the decline, which is a pretty remarkable accomplishment when you think about how many more of us are driving these days compared to, say 25 years ago. Probably attributable to safer cars and increased awareness of (and enforcement of) drunk driving laws. Speeding and driving while distracted are the two next big targets.

Continue reading Oh, sorry, wasn't paying attention

Traffic enforcement

I want to thank commenter eah919 for pointing me to Tom Vanderbilt's recent article in Slate.com, In Praise of Traffic Tickets.

I've emailed copies of the article to our Police Chief, City Manager, and Council members. If you agree that the article makes some very good points, particularly the analogy of speeders and other driving violators as mobile "broken windows," (a point which Michael Bacon and i have both made on numerous occasions) please consider letting our elected and appointed officials know.

Email them at:
Tom.Bonfield@DurhamNC.Gov; Jose.Lopez@DurhamNC.Gov; Council@DurhamNC.Gov.

Some excerpts from the article:

The consequences of not issuing tickets were shown in a recent study of traffic violations in New York City. From 2001 to 2006, the number of fatalities in which speeding was implicated rose 11 percent. During the same period, the number of speeding summons issued by the NYPD dropped 11 percent. Similarly, summonses for red-light-running violations dropped 13 percent between 2006 and 2008, even as the number of crashes increased. As an alternative approach, consider France, where the dangerous driver is as storied a cliché as a beret on the head and a baguette under the arm. As the ITE Journal notes, since 2000, France has reduced its road fatality rate by an incredible 43 percent. Instrumental in that reduction has been a roll-out of automated speed cameras and a toughening of penalties. For example, negligent driving resulting in a death, which often results in little punishment in the United States, carries a penalty of five years in prison and a 75,000-euro fine.

The "folk crime" belief helps thwart increased traffic enforcement: Why should the NYPD, whose resources and manpower are already stretched, bust people for dangerous driving when they could be going after murderers? Well, apart from the fact that more people are killed in traffic fatalities in New York City every year than they are in "stranger homicides," there is the idea, related to the link between on-and-off-road criminality, that targeting traffic violators might be an effective way to combat other crimes. Which brings us to the third benefit of traffic tickets: increased public safety. Hence the new Department of Justice initiative called DDACTS, or Data Driven Approaches to Crime and Traffic Safety, which has found that there is often a geographic link between traffic crashes and crime. By putting "high-visibility enforcement" in hot spots of both crime and traffic crashes, cities like Baltimore have seen reductions in both.

The program recalls the "broken windows" theory, made famous by James Q. Wilson and George Kelling, which argued, using the metaphor of one broken window on a building inexorably leading to more, that not enforcing smaller, "quality-of-life" issues encourages larger transgressions:

Window-breaking does not necessarily occur on a large scale because some areas are inhabited by determined window-breakers whereas others are populated by window-lovers; rather, one unrepaired broken window is a signal that no one cares, and so breaking more windows costs nothing.

Both broken windows and data-driven policing have offered as at least partial explanations for New York City's declining crime rate, and it would seem logical that a similar program would help reduce the level of traffic deaths and injury. One person driving fast, or going through a red light, or even failing to signal, is essentially a broken window—a sign that no one cares. But again we come up against social resistance in equating aggressive driving with crime. This was nowhere more evident than in a review of my book Traffic by James Q. Wilson himself, who opened with the statement: "I drive my car very fast." Now, I have no way of knowing how fast "very fast" is or where he does this fast driving. And even though the review is a nice one, I couldn't help but notice the irony that this behavior is presumably against the law, and the fact that he does it without reprimand contributes to a lessened respect for traffic law and perhaps the law itself. ("We suggest," as it was put in the broken-windows article, "that 'untended' behavior also leads to the breakdown of community controls.")

Continue reading Traffic enforcement

More on speeding

Or it that morons speeding?

Noticed yesterday afternoon that the fire hydrant right up near the traffic circle on Markham/Glendale was no more.

Clearly, someone was distracted by the possibility of an angry neighbor with a paintball gun lurking in the bushes, so, at 12 miles an hour, they crept through the traffic circle, but drove over the fire hydrant..

Oh, come on.

Someone tried to take the circle at 50+ mph, and missed. Probably the third or fourth time the hydrant's been taken out in the past few years. Fortunately, no one was walking there at the time.

I happened to catch the Public Works crew when they showed up this morning to replace the hydrant. They were pissed that the top part was missing. Scrap metal, or souvenir?

My money's on the latter.

Anyone want to take a stab at how much it costs to replace a fire hydrant vs. how much it costs to write a goddamn speeding ticket or three?

Continue reading More on speeding

Your best entertainment value

WRAL commenters.

. . . and it looks like our Angry Neighbors have a blog!

Continue reading Your best entertainment value

Latest from "Angry Neighbors"

Got this from the folks behind the Angry Neighbors brouhaha this morning. Hope to have a response from DPD and/or the city sometime soon.

Angry Neighbors With Paintball Guns are amazed and gratified at the reaction to the first step of our citizens' campaign to reduce speeding on neighborhood streets in the city of Durham. We posted three small signs in two locations in one neighborhood. We received top story coverage on local television news, more than half a dozen requests for interviews from local media outlets, and generated hundreds of comments on blogs, media websites, and Facebook. We received numerous requests from individuals who wish to receive their own copies of our sign. We inspired the creation of a Facebook group. We clearly touched a nerve in the city of Durham.

The Durham Police Department has issued an eight paragraph statement in response to our signs. We have the utmost respect for the officers of the Durham Police Department. They put their lives on the line for us every day.

Durham PD's statement includes a series of statistics relating the number of traffic tickets written in July 2009 in a 3 block area near the locations where our signs were installed. They state that 46 hours of police activity resulted in 64 citations being written.

We have two responses to that.

First, the problem of speeding in our neighborhoods is not confined to one area in Durham. It is a citywide problem. The city must adopt a unified approach to the problem. It is unfair to the citizens of Durham to approach the problem in a piecemeal fashion. It is unfair to the overwhelming majority of law abiding citizens in Durham to wait until problems become so serious on any one block that neighbors feel their basic safety is threatened. The culture of people driving as fast as they please through neighborhood streets without any regard for the safety of the neighbors who live and play there must change. Part of that change must come from an increased commitment from the leadership of the law enforcement community.

Second, if the police wrote 64 tickets in 46 hours of monitoring one small area over a one month period, how many could they write with 200 hours of monitoring the entire city? Traffic studies in many neighborhoods consistently place the 80th percentile of traffic speeds 10, 12, or even 15 miles per hour over the posted speed limit. In some cases, the response of the city of Durham has been to propose raising the posted speed limit!

Many of us, as individuals, have tried to work to resolve this problem. Here are two immediate steps the city of Durham can take to help.

One, restore the citizen participation PACE Car program. We are discouraged to read that the city has neither the time nor the money to continue this very successful program. Over 1500 citizens signed up to participate in the 18 months the program was operational. Bring it back. Tell us how much money you need. We'll raise it.

Two, get serious with city employees who violate speed limits and other traffic laws. Set an example by cleaning up your own house. When we see you driving 45 mph or 50 mph in a 35 mph zone, we realize that you don't care about our city and our neighbors. Join us, don't fight us.

Stay tuned for further developments.

AngryNeighborWithPaintballGun@gmail.com

Continue reading Latest from "Angry Neighbors"

Durham police statement

As posted at NBC-17:

The Durham Police Department is aware of the news release sent out by Angry Neighbors with Paintball Guns that mentions concerns about speeding in neighborhoods.

The Durham Police Department enforces traffic laws and we plan to continue to be responsive to traffic concerns from residents throughout the city. We have recently focused on traffic enforcement in the neighborhood where these signs appeared this morning and residents have complimented us on our response.

While we are concerned about speeding in neighborhoods, the Police Department believes that these signs are inappropriate and potentially dangerous. We fear that these signs could be a distraction to even the most law-abiding motorists and possibly cause collisions.

Citizens who engage in the activities advocated by these signs could be subject to civil and even criminal sanctions. By law, if a motorist reasonably believed that his or her property might be damaged, the person who posted these signs could be subject to criminal charges.

We ask residents with concerns about speeding to contact our Traffic Services Unit at 560-4935.

The Pace Car program is inactive at this time due to budget and staffing constraints.

The Police Department's Traffic Services Unit has been active in the neighborhood this summer (these statistics are just from the Motorcycle Unit and do not include tickets written by other officers) -

July 2009
Mangum between Lynch and Trinity: 20hrs - 4 warning tickets - 33 citations.
E. Trinity between Glendale and Mangum: 14hrs - 3 warning tickets - 19 citations.
June 2009
Mangum between Lynch and Trinity: 7hrs - 0 warning tickets - 11 citations.
E. Trinity between Glendale and Mangum: 5hrs - 0 warning tickets - 11 citations.

So, in the month of July, the Durham Police Department spent 46 hours observing traffic violations in the surrounding area. In that 46 hours, they wrote 64 tickets.

About 1.5/hour. Umm, I can find that many speeders on those streets in 2 hours. But even giving them credit for that bit of enforcement, what's 46 hours over the course of a month? And what about the rest of the city that's not between Lynch and Trinity?

I believe the point remains, the City of Durham does not recognize the extent of the problem.

And this is gold: "The Pace Car program is inactive at this time due to budget and staffing constraints."

Let's do better than that, please.

And on a totally separate note, if this is true: "We fear that these signs could be a distraction to even the most law-abiding motorists and possibly cause collisions." Then what does that say for the distractive ability of billboards, especially those electronic billboards that Fairway advertising wants to install on our roads where 65 mph travel is the norm?

Continue reading Durham police statement

Facebook

Looks like the "Angry Neighbor" campaign has inspired the creation of a Facebook group.

I'm in.

Continue reading Facebook

Angry neighbor update

Sent an email to the address in the release. Got this response:

"Who we are isn't important. What is important is that the city of Durham realize this is a problem that needs to be solved.

Stay tuned for further developments."

I haven't been this intrigued since Blazer Manpurse left us.

Continue reading Angry neighbor update

Angry neighbors

With paintball guns?

Received this morning:

Angry Neighbors With Paintball Guns announces the beginning of a citizens' campaign to reduce speeding on neighborhood streets in the city of Durham.

We are a small group of neighbors who have reached the limits of our patience with the city's inability, some might say unwillingness, to address this issue. We are disappointed that the city has stopped funding and promoting its PACE Car program, which was a successful first step in reclaiming our neighborhood streets from those who abuse the privilege of driving. We are frustrated by the ongoing problem of city of Durham vehicles, including garbage trucks and DATA buses disregarding posted speed limits in our neighborhoods with impunity.

By posting these signs in strategic locations throughout the city, we seek to make those individuals who threaten the safety of our neighborhoods by their thoughtless and dangerous behavior aware that our patience is at an end. We also seek to make the city of Durham aware that the problem is no longer one that can be safely ignored.

Contact - AngryNeighborWithPaintballGun@gmail.com

Continue reading Angry neighbors

So that's what it takes

To get municipal and NCDOT officials on the same page to improve conditions on our surface streets.

Damn shame, if you ask me.

Two weeks after the death of a 16-year-old girl at an intersection near Cary Park, town officials and the state Department of Transportation have agreed on plans to try to make the crossing safer for pedestrians and drivers alike.

A traffic signal and pedestrian crossing lights with countdown timers will be installed at the intersection at Green Level to Durham Road and Cary Glen Boulevard within 60 days, the town announced Thursday. Such a project usually takes up to six months, but city and state officials said they hope to expedite the process.

In addition, Cary officials will conduct a long-term study of traffic along Green Level to Durham Road between Morrisville Parkway and McCrimmon Parkway in hopes of relieving other driver and pedestrian concerns, said Director of Engineering Tim Bailey.

"We did receive a lot of feedback from citizens in the area about travel patterns along that corridor, complaints about things like people speeding or pedestrian travel paths, that aren't completely addressed with the installation of a traffic signal," Bailey said. "We want to help deal more broadly with the citizen concerns that we saw and create a better opportunity for more citizen feedback."

I don't think we have enough 16 year olds to sacrifice to the traffic gods in order to improve all the unsafe roads and bad driving habits in the Triangle. Maybe some of our officials could be proactive in this, and not wait for more deaths to act.

Continue reading So that's what it takes

Why we love the NCDOT

The city is limited in what calming measures it can install on Roxboro and Mangum streets because they are part of U.S. 15-501 Business and are a designated truck route.

Loziuk has asked the state Department of Transportation about lowering the speed limit on Roxboro and Mangum, but "They're just flat out saying they wouldn't even consider it," he said.

Here's a thought. Have Durham PD conduct a zero tolerance program on Roxboro, Trinity, and Mangum for a month. Everyone exceeding the speed limit gets a ticket. Every out of date registration gets a ticket. Every lane change without a signal gets a ticket. Every failure to yield to a pedestrian in a crosswalk gets a ticket.

Betcha that NCDOT will come to the table and work with the city on some sane traffic calming measures then.

Continue reading Why we love the NCDOT

It's not a bug, it's a feature

As reports in the HS and N&O note this morning, new city manager Tom Bonfield remarked during his meet the press session yesterday that "The streets are in terrible shape. Public Works isn't going to be happy about me saying that, but there are a lot of bumpy roads, and things like that that need to be dealt with."

Tom, Tom, Tom.

Those aren't "bumpy roads."

That's our traffic calming and pedestrian safety program in action.

Welcome to Durham.

Continue reading It's not a bug, it's a feature