PEDS Blog

You could win a prize by reporting hazardous wires.  Utility wires, telephone lines or metal cables across the sidewalks can trip people up and cause serious injury. Help PEDS untangle our sidewalks. The more wires you report in March, the more chances you have to win! Full details here.

How to Win

1. Find and record the location of hazardous wires (telephone lines, cables or other utility wires) in the sidewalk zone. Take photos if possible. Use our printable form to make reporting easy.
2. Use PEDS’ online hazard reporting tool to submit your wire reports and photos.
3. Cross your fingers.

Throughout Georgia, marked crosswalks are disappearing at unsignalized intersections when the Georgia Department of Transportation resurfaces multi-lane roads.  GDOT engineers point to research showing that marked crosswalks, on their own, are not enough to provide safe pedestrian crossings on multi-lane roads used by over 12,000 cars a day.

After reading GDOT’s justification for removing a crosswalk on Roswell Road, we reminded District 7 engineer Bryant Poole that federal guidelines recommend that where crosswalks alone are insufficient to create safe crossings, transportation agencies need to do more, not less. High-speed multi-lane roads like Roswell Road account for 65 percent of all pedestrian fatalities nationwide. Removing crosswalks does not solve the problem of getting pedestrians safely across the street.

If marked crosswalks, on their own, are inappropriate as a solution, engineers need to identify other solutions that enable pedestrians to cross the street safely and conveniently.  As FHWA puts it, “Regardless of whether marked crosswalks are used, there remains the fundamental obligation to get pedestrians safely across the street.  If one treatment does not accomplish the task adequately, then move on to the next one. Failure of one particular treatment is not a license to give up and do nothing.”

PEDS is monitoring and speaking up about state legislation of interest to pedestrians. House Bill 938, which prohibits reading or sending text messages while operating a motor vehicle, would greatly reduce risk to all road users. Please call or email your state representative to express support for this bill. Find your state representatives here.  Once you know who they are, get their contact information and voice your support!

Remind them that texting and driving is worse than drinking and driving.  Not convinced? Check out this CNBC video:

Led by Director Bob Dallas,the Georgia Governor’s Office of Highway Safety understands the importance of sharing the road, the relationship between land use and transportation, and the impact of street design on safety. GOHS also knows that one pedestrians account for one out of eight traffic fatalities in metro Atlanta.

Recognizing PEDS as a valuable partner in its efforts to increase safety, GOHS recently renewed its support by awarding us a $69,100 grant. We’ll use these funds to:

• Take a seat at the transportation planning table by participating in numerous public meetings and serving on local, regional, and state task forces and advisory committees.
• Generate media attention to the difficulty of accessing transit on high speed, multi-lane roads that lack safe crossings.
• Conduct site visits and walking tours that increase awareness of the need to repair broken sidewalks and create safer crossings
• Participate in radio talk shows, where we’ll discuss drivers’ responsibilities to pedestrians
• Work with police officers and the media to facilitate high visibility crosswalk sting operations.

PEDS thanks the Georgia Governor’s Office of Highway Safety for partnering with us to promote safe, accessible streets for pedestrians.

On November 10, PEDS presented Golden Shoe Awards to people, projects and places that have contributed significantly this year to making metro Atlanta communities more walkable. See photos here.

These awardees offer hope that the region will become safer and more inviting for pedestrians. Last Monday, two national organizations released a report ranking metro Atlanta the 10th most dangerous place in the country for pedestrians (details here). PEDS thanks the winners for all they’re doing to make metro Atlanta more walkable.

2009 GOLDEN SHOE AWARDEES:

Pedestrian-friendly Development: Selig Enterprises and Daniel Corporation for the 1010 Building, a high-density, mixed-use development that is transforming an entire block of Peachtree Street in Midtown into a magnet for pedestrians.

Pedestrian-friendly Road Diet: Midtown Alliance for eliminating dangerous right turn lanes and converting two lanes of Peachtree Street in Midtown to parking spaces, median refuge islands and an inviting piazza near Colony Square and the Woodruff Arts Center as a gathering place for people on foot.

Pedestrian-friendly Public Engagement: City of Atlanta and Glatting Jackson for the Connect Atlanta Plan’s public engagement process, which educated Atlantans about the contributions short blocks and a well-connected street grid make to creating truly walkable communities.

Pedestrian-friendly Traffic Operations: City of Suwanee for installing Georgia’s first HAWK signal, an innovative tool for creating safer street crossings at locations where traditional traffic signals are not warranted.

Pedestrian-friendly Enforcement: Georgia State University Police, for addressing risks created by people who talk on cell phones or text while driving. GSU police issued 100 “failure to show due care” citations to motorists using cell phones while violating crosswalk or other laws.

Pedestrian-friendly Activism: Jim Durrett whose leadership at the Livable Communities Coalition and the Urban Land Institute created thriving regional organizations that encourage dense, pedestrian-friendly development and transportation investments linked to land use.

Pedestrian-friendly Journalism: Writer John Becker, whose Take to Task columns in the AJC, are bringing attention to perils for pedestrians caused by broken infrastructure and for his persistent efforts to hold government officials accountable for addressing hazards.

Funding Pedestrian-friendly Education: The Buckhead Coalition, for offering to pay 75 percent of the cost of speed radar signs in Buckhead neighborhoods. By providing instant feedback on driving speed, radar signs encourage motorists to slow down.

Dangerous by Design (PDF), a report released last week by Transportation for America and the Surface Transportation Policy Group, ranked Atlanta as the nation’s 10th most dangerous large metropolitan area.

PEDS isn’t surprised. In the region’s 5 core counties:

• 3 pedestrians are struck by drivers every day.
• 60 pedestrians were killed and more than 1,000 were injured in 2008.
• Safe crossings are few and far between on high speed, multi-lane streets.

Metro Atlanta ranks poorly because our transportation agencies don’t invest enough in sidewalks and safe crossings. Pedestrians account for 9.7 percent of all traffic deaths in Georgia. Yet only 1.7 percent of Georgia’s federal transportation funds are used for pedestrian facilities.

PEDS partnered with the Livable Communities Coalition to release the report to local media. Watch the CBS News Video.

Metro Atlanta’s poor ranking is a call to action. Transportation agencies must:

1. retrofit multi-lane roads with sidewalks, safe and convenient crossings and infrastructure that discourages speeding.
2. commit a fair share of transportation funding – at least 9.7 percent – to projects that support pedestrian safety.
3. adopt “complete streets” policies to ensure future transportation investments safely accommodate all transportation users.

Georgia law prohibits parking on the sidewalk and driving upon a sidewalk except where authorized driveways are provided. Yet, many government employees and contractors drive over the curb and park on the sidewalks anyway. PEDS is working to end this practice by getting government agencies to obey and enforce their own laws. The City of Atlanta will soon privatize its parking enforcement. That will likely provide the needed incentive to ticket violators.

People who attended yesterday evening’s mayoral forum sponsored by Atlanta Bicycle Coalition, Citizens for Progressive Transportation and PEDS learned a lot about the candidate’s lifestyles and understanding of smart growth and transportation issues. Check out Jeanne Bonner’s blog.  PEDS thanks Maria Saporta for the terrific questions that revealed so much about each of the candidates.

Let us know what you think of the candidates’ positions on sustainable transportation.

On September 17 and 18, PEDS will host two workshops for transportation professionals entitled Designing Pedestrian Facilities for Accessibility. The September 18 workshop has already sold out, but registration for the September 17 workshop is still available.

These interactive one-day workshops will be led by nationally recognized pedestrian expert Michael Ronkin and a US Access Board trainer, and will cover sidewalk design, legal policies, retrofits, crossings, curb ramps, the latest ADA requirements, pedestrian signals and much more. PEDS thanks the following sponsors for making these workshops possible.

PEDS applauds the City of Suwanee for installing and activating Georgia’s first HAWK signal — a pedestrian-activated red light — at a busy Buford Highway crosswalk. HAWK stands for High-intensity Activated crossWalK. PEDS has been pushing transportation departments to use these for years. The 11-Alive News video below from back in July explains how they’ll work.

HAWK signals are ideal for crosswalks at uncontrolled locations (no traffic light or stop sign) on multi-lane, high-speed roads. PEDS congratulates Suwanee for taking the lead on implementing this technology. Making Suwanee a walkable city certainly contributes to its selection as one of CNN Money’s “Best Places to Live.”