Ongoing Calgarians complaining about pedestrian bridges thread

[FireGilbert]

Originally Posted by getbak

While it's easy to say they should have just built a pedestrian bridge over Memorial by the bridge, where would it go?

A bridge would need to be tall enough that the vehicles on Memorial can pass under it, and you need to have ramps to get people from ground level up to the height of the bridge.

Ramps take up a lot of space. Look at the other pedestrian bridges over Memorial (9A St, Prince's Island, Bridgeland C-Train, and Franklin C-Train). The ramps to access those bridges take up a lot of room.

There is no room for a ramp on the north side of Memorial near the bridge. To build one, the city would either have to buy and demolish one (or more) of the houses along Memorial there (which would not be cheap), or build the pedestrian bridge right at 8th Street and build the ramp in the middle of the street, blocking vehicular access between Memorial and 8th St (similar to what was done at 15th Ave across Macleod from the Stampede C-Train station). That would be the only real workable solution, but would cause uproar from people who use the 8th St-Memorial intersection on a regular basis.

They wouldn't have needed another pedestrian bridge if the Peace bridge itself was built over Memorial. The one to the east from Princes Island with stairs/ramps on both sides of Memorial was a great design and they should have copied that.

Also, so what if they had to close off the 8th street vehicle access to Memorial? As someone who used to live on 8th street and 1st ave having to exit/enter Sunnyside via 9th or 5th would have been an excellent trade off to getting a proper bridge over Memorial.

[Fuzz]

Well, you do exactly that. Close 8th st to traffic, get rid of the surface crossing at 7th and open that to Memorial. Then you have vehicle access at 9th and 7th instead of 9th and 8th. Currently the only people I ever see using the 8th st access is pedestrians(and the odd stupid cyclist) J-walking.

[getbak]

Originally Posted by FireGilbert

They wouldn't have needed another pedestrian bridge if the Peace bridge itself was built over Memorial. The one to the east from Princes Island with stairs/ramps on both sides of Memorial was a great design and they should have copied that.

Also, so what if they had to close off the 8th street vehicle access to Memorial? As someone who used to live on 8th street and 1st ave having to exit/enter Sunnyside via 9th or 5th would have been an excellent trade off to getting a proper bridge over Memorial.

I agree. I was just pointing out that saying "they should just build a bridge over Memorial" isn't as simple as it sounds.

[Fuzz]

I didn't say it was simple. That's why you pay engineers and architects to design things that work well in complicated situations. Will there be compromises? Sure. But I'd argue they are worth it compared to what we now have. Two surface crossings that can be dangerous, inconveniences all users and I'd be willing to bet within 20 years will be removed for a bridge, which means the money spent on the lights will be thrown away. Typical Calgary. Why do it right when you can do it twice?

Regarding safety, just last week a car crashed into the 7th st light post and it looks like 2 other vehicles were involved. No idea why but it wouldn't have happened if a bridge were there. Even with 2 crossings you are still going to have people crossing dangerously at 8th. I can't count the number of times I've seen vehicles blow though the pedestrian crossing, either because they couldn't see the light change due to low sun angles, or because they are d-bags.

[Bunk]

Personally I think one at 8th would have been better than 7th and 9th. I also have no problem with crossings being at grade. Memorial isn't and shouldn't be treated as a highway where pedestrians have no place.

[Fuzz]

It's not a highway, but pedestrians have no place on it. You can't just walk out and have traffic yield to you. If you wan to cross, you have to press the beg button, wait, make sure everyone actually stops, then go. A bridge is more convenient and safe for all users. Sometimes separating users just makes more sense. I'm fine with keeping a low speed limit on Memorial, I'm not arguing that it should be made free flow for the sake of traffic.

[Bigtime]

iPhone pic of the new lights, a HUGE improvement over the original lights. Also the floor lighting has been put into what appear to be much better fixtures that should hopefully stand up to the seasons:

[GGG]

Originally Posted by FireGilbert

They wouldn't have needed another pedestrian bridge if the Peace bridge itself was built over Memorial. The one to the east from Princes Island with stairs/ramps on both sides of Memorial was a great design and they should have copied that.

Also, so what if they had to close off the 8th street vehicle access to Memorial? As someone who used to live on 8th street and 1st ave having to exit/enter Sunnyside via 9th or 5th would have been an excellent trade off to getting a proper bridge over Memorial.

I think you ran into elevation issues with the helipad on the other side of you elevated to cross memorial as part of the span.

[Bunk]

No one ever gets to complain about the cost of pedestrian bridges ever again.



http://www.transportation.alberta.ca...ule18-AppE.pdf

[nik-]

What is this Satanism?

It makes sense when you look at all the interchanges, but it's the visual equivalent to seeing a guy pulling a half eaten dishrag out the wrong end of his dog in the park. Ugly and a little sad.

[FireGilbert]

I think it looks like a plate of delicious spaghetti.

[Fuzz]

Finally! A place for the cars to play! Looks like fun.

[jwslam]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

Twice a day I hit that cross walk button, watch 100 vehicles have to stop and go and think about all the gas burned/wear and tear on vehicles/lost time and that at some point it must cost more than it would have to just build a short bridge over Memorial like any sane project would have done.

Off topic: I think about how many cars burn gas sitting in traffic every time there's a vehicle collision. They should totally ding the guy who causes that ##### with a heavy carbon tax.

On topic: I've only ever used that bridge once.

[HotHotHeat]

Is this an appropriate place to discuss the hilarious disaster that is the 8st. underpass?

I noticed this morning they have permanently installed road markers about 6 inches into the outside driving lane in each direction. Doesn't sound like much, but that roadway is already really narrow. Now they have rail posts sticking out of the concrete to make it even better!

Now over a year in progress too.

[Fuzz]

They look to be about done. Much brighter. I spoke to a few of the workers last week and they said they are not replacing the lower fluorescent tubes.

[calgarygeologist]

Originally Posted by Bunk

No one ever gets to complain about the cost of pedestrian bridges ever again.



http://www.transportation.alberta.ca...ule18-AppE.pdf

I don't like all these multi-bend roads. Build a straight road whenever possible because we have winter, snow and ice which will cause vehicles to not be able to navigate the bends.

[MrMastodonFarm]

Well unfortunately straight giant intersections just won't work.

[calgarygeologist]

Originally Posted by MrMastodonFarm

Well unfortunately straight giant intersections just won't work.

Right. But surely there must be a better way of designing those road ways so that northbound Stoney onto eastbound Glenmore doesn't have three 90 degree bends. Also, it looks like northbound Stoney can easily be straight lined into northbound Sarcee instead of having three soft bends. The overall design just looks like a lot of unnecessary and complicated bends.

[Kavvy]

Originally Posted by calgarygeologist

Right. But surely there must be a better way of designing those road ways so that northbound Stoney onto eastbound Glenmore doesn't have three 90 degree bends. Also, it looks like northbound Stoney can easily be straight lined into northbound Sarcee instead of having three soft bends. The overall design just looks like a lot of unnecessary and complicated bends.

Just to clarify, are you frustrated at the fact that 90 degree bends exist in the plan, or the bend radius of said bends?

Two different things and if you have perpendicular roads.......

[calgarygeologist]

Originally Posted by Kavvy

Just to clarify, are you frustrated at the fact that 90 degree bends exist in the plan, or the bend radius of said bends?

Two different things and if you have perpendicular roads.......

In the case of NB Stoney onto EB Glenmore the overall design with three tight bends is absurd. It should just be a simple sweeping ramp but instead they have a tight right bend followed by a tight left and lastly a tight right to get aligned with Glenmore.

In some of the other cases the bends shouldn't exist at all when a straight segment can be put through.