Pedestrian Accident Map: Calgary 1996-2012

[Burninator]

I guess the data doesn't really back this up but I work downtown and live in the deep south and I am way more cautious when I am crossing the road in the south. I think because there are fewer pedestrians people turn their brains off to them. Having to cross a 4 lane road when one lane stops for me and cars in the other lane just blow through the intersection makes me ballistic.

[calgarywinning]

What about making the C-Train more pedestrian friendly? Can we possibly take the pedestrian and send them IBeacons to their headphones that they are about to be hit. What about auto texts to tell warn them. Perhaps, C-Trains need to learn how to operate friendlier and realize all people on foot are at a disadvantage to the speed and how about a bike track along the ctrain route? There is a real difficulty on a train moving at an operating speed taking into effect all these calculations and stopping on a dime with it's inertia. Same with automobiles. There is a death chain and it has to to with curb weight * speed = inertia. No matter how good the operator is the pedestrian will have the most to lose. As bad as I feel about the loss tonight, I feel bad about the operator of the train and also the first responders and the families that will live with this.

Distracted walking and driving are epidemics. This is number 1 on the worst offenders. Having headphones on and ignoring your surrounding's is just as bad as texting in an automobile. I feel terrible for these people. Add this up with being tired, not alert or how about a screwdriver on the way to work.

Pedestrian behaviour is abysmal. Also, driver behaviour to pedestrians and cyclists is abysmal. It's like this area of the law isn't enforced. I especially agree further out in the perimeter people all but ignore crosswalks, the pedestrian and the rules. Under the traffic act this expensive with massive demerit point loss. I witness failure to stop at crosswalks daily!

While we can engineer better road signage and painting it's only part of the answer. I think in the NY example you will see they had foot officers on hand long enough to ticket all offenders to make the change effective. I believe this intersection is in the meat packing district. Our city maybe to sprawling but in order to make things better we will need to enforce any changes we make with officers on foot to ticket offenders continuously until the patterns finally changed, less about paint and more about enforcement. Real change is effected by people on the ground committed to an outcome. That's where the city should look if it wants to truly make Calgary commutable for all forms of transportation.

[Tinordi]

The modern world is moving toward prioritizing pedestrians comfort and safety over the ability of vehicles to move quickly. Makes for a better city, more safety, less driving, less emissions, less noise, better economy.

[Tinordi]

We can navel gaze, shake our fists at clouds, and bemoan how people ought to behave like many are doing in this thread but that's not a real solution to both collisions and the issue of urban traffic in general. I believe this is really a design issue and agree completely with the "complete streets" concept of urban systems. It's the job of city planners, transportation engineers and community residents to design their road network so that it is incorporated into the multi-modal mix of transit. We're basically used to vehicles simply dominating urban space, why else would we think of any other way? Well because 40% of all trips in Canada are in a pedestrian mode. It's huge. That picture of the redesigned intersection in New York highlights those principles. It's just a fundamentally better design after decades of experience of what not to do.

[Bill Bumface]

Originally Posted by fotze

I think the biggest thing is the turning right on red, I bet that's where most happen.

I agree. In lots of countries it's not legal to turn right on a red, and therefore, if you have a walk light, you know there is no traffic to watch for, because someone is running a red to mow you down (yah, you should still look).

As a car, there is no looking for traffic one way, then looking for pedestrians the other way, then double checking there is no lunatic on a bike screaming up your right side, then turning and hoping you got all 3 of those correct. That just seems like an inherently unsafe setup.

Dowtown at least, they should eliminate right turns on red lights (it would actually piss a large part of me off, but another part would know it was for the best).

Right turn lights where pedestrians have a do-not walk are great to get a more known amount of cars through each light cycle to improve signal synchronization as well.

[Tinordi]

Originally Posted by fotze

That intersection in New York is a disaster. Amazing what just some paint and some medians do. Pedestrians and drivers have no idea where the hell to be going which is a recipe for disaster. People assume that the roads should be designed for the people driving the same road 200 days a year, but we all know as drivers (in cruel and ironic fashion)that traffic is ruthlessly dictated by the biggest strugglers. You can have 99% awesome drivers, but that 1% dictates how the rest go.

Kind of speaks to my point. We have decades of history driving a certain way, understanding how intersections *should* work which is the problem. For your point to stand we'd have to demonstrate that accidents are just as common with this new design and that it's a disaster by design not be lack of familiarity. I'd be pretty confident that both answers would support the redesign.

[Addick]

Originally Posted by normtwofinger

I've said it before - let cars have the right of way over pedestrians. The majority of the world is this way. After experiencing a city/country where pedestrians yield to cars, it appears to be more safe.

I've seen the benefits of this system but I'd be wary of attempting to introduce it in Canada. If it were only the pedestrians that were not paying attention it could be successful but many drivers in Calgary and the rest of the country are just as inattentive. I've been to many places where vehicles had the right-of-way but these places also didn't need to implement Distracted Driving laws.

Due to the situation in which we find ourselves, I think the focus needs to be on making sure everyone knows their responsibilities rather than removing or shifting responsibility.