Decatur's Bermuda Triangle
September 2, 2008 | 3:03 pmAndy over at Fresh Loaf is calling for a traffic light at one of Decatur’s most dangerous crosswalks…the one that crosses W. Howard at Adair St. He even seems to have taken his life in his hands and taken a pic from the W. Howard sidewalk.
The Community Transportation Plan does address this area of W. Howard by turning the pretzel-of-an-intersection that is Atlanta Ave. into a straight connection between W. College and W. Howard.
Such a redesign will ultimately move the light currently at Atlanta Ave (near the Citgo) closer to Adair. But this plan is a few years down the road.
As someone who frequently turns right on to W. Howard from Adair in the morning, I can tell you it is pretty dangerous (though less dangerous than turning left onto Scott from Ponce Heights during rush hour!) to look left for traffic flying down Howard and at whomever is turning left onto Howard after crossing the tracks AND making sure there are no pedestrians crossing at the intersection. (I believe after the JavaMonkey girls where hit on their scooter on W. Howard, Scott commented that the crossing guard at Adair had said to him that she now turned away from impending car accidents because she was sick of being a witness.)
So maybe a traffic light at Adair is a good temporary solution. But I’m gonna guess there is some issue with traffic flow over the tracks and the light at Atlanta Ave that is currently preventing one. So instead we get waving crossing guards and a cop.
Janice, the former crossing guard at Adair and West Howard, said the same thing to me about turning away from accidents. I’m pretty sure she meant it as a bleak joke though. I don’t think she meant that she actually turned away from accidents to avoid court.
Whether it’s traffic lights, or redesign, the traffic needs to be slowed down — not just on near Adair, but all the way to Downtown Atlanta. The speed limit is 35, but people do 50-60 there.
Incidentally, I wasn’t risking my life. I was saving my rugs. I walk my dogs there in the morning and afternoon.
Super dangerous intersection. I look right, left, right, left again, check for pedestrians coming from behind the Friends hedge, check left again–auggh.
I agree, that’s a pretty crazy area. I live on Adair and frequently come in and out of there, car and walking. The redesign would be great, but the last thing I’d like to see is another traffic light in addition to the one at Citgo and the crazy light situation crossing the tracks. I hope there’s a simpler temporary solution until a whole redesign could take place.
The turn from Adair is tough, but so is the left turn onto Howard for those crossing north over the tracks – you have to pull out into one of the eastbound lanes just to see around the STUPID bushes they’ve put up on that little island. And even if it looks clear and you pull out, cars come flying over that hill by the Citgo.
So of course you’re trying to accelerate to 50 mph to avoid getting drilled, and you do so right in front of the folks coming out of Adair.
Just a terrible intersection all around.
This is one of those intersections that I always prefer to cross as a pedestrian, because autos are generally punished severely with painfully long waits to cross the tracks from W Howard. This intersection seemed to function much better before the traffic signals were added. Ever since the Transportation Plan was unveiled, I’ve been excitedly awaiting the redesign of the intersection into something more functional (and safer!).
I will forewarn those who would like to make suggestions: the City does not appear interested in them if they’re not in the current Plan. They will likely accommodate some residential changes (such as added speed humps or stop signs on side streets) but Engineering seems to have been given instructions that if it’s not designated in the Plan, it won’t happen.
Taking another look at that proposed design – that’s no solution. It’ll be safer, but much more of a traffic nightmare. Like the crossing at McDonough, it will take forever to get through.
We need more traffic circles.
If you look at all the transportation recommendations, it looks like they’re gearing up to handle more cars at this crossing. Take a look at the McDonough plan. It seems to eliminate a left turn on Howard when heading north over the tracks, which means traffic that normally crosses there to head westbound on Howard will now head down College to cross at the Atlanta/Howard/Adair spot.
As I see it, that takes traffic off of Howard — a road *way* below its over-engineered capacity — and puts it on College, which is at or near its max load. That sounds like a bad plan.
As for the traffic circles, I agree they’re a great tool for handling capacity issues but they’re a poor tool for pedestrian enhancements. Since their goal is free moving flow, they don’t provide the necessary breaks for safe crossing on foot or bike during periods of heavy use.
As someone who lives right at the intersection in question and overlooks it all day. The problem is speed. The intersection is not that bad if you are driving at a normal speed (and being a considerate driver helps), but Andisheh is right that most people are doing 50+. The Decatur PD are well aware, as they were using our driveway for some unmarked recon on the area a week or so ago to see for themselves.
Honestly, I guess it’s what you’re used to, as I was kind of surprised by all the posts about it today. Never thought it was *that* bad. cheers.
For everyone complaining about how bad it is to drive through… try backing out of your driveway into it daily. Then talk to me.
I have walked across that intersection, almost daily, as have my children, for years (almost 20). I agree that speeding cars passing though are a big problem. I don’t see the landscaping as a problem. We need more not less in this city. Whatever happened to the transportation bond issue of a few years ago? One of the projects listed by the city administration was improvements at that crossing?
The bond issue is alive and well. As with any public works project, it take time.
Garsh!
Has anyone thought how inconsiderate our safety whining is with regards to CSX? I mean, they are not to be questioned and have not a thought in the world to what the actual PEOPLE are concerend with whose lives abut their property.
Blaring horns at 4AM in the morning with not a car in sight….CAN DO! Yet the CSX passes across Coventry Road near Fernabnk fifty feet from homes and not a horn to be heard. Besides, if we complain too much they will put up a fence on BOTH sides of the tracks and then our children can no longer risk their lives TWICE daily crossing the RR to get to Renfroe while our police look the other way, despite repeated phone calls concerned about this ongoing “accident waiting to happen”.
This intersection, along with McDonough, is designed to best suit the needs of CSX and that is all that matters. If we Decaturites need to cross the tracks, we should just have to go to either underpass at Columbia or Rocky Ford.
CSX knows what’s best. Just ask them
The railroads are required by the Federal Railroad Administration to sound warning horns at nearly every road crossing in the country, signaled or not. If you don’t hear the horns at Coventry, it’s because you’re not noticing them.
Part of the Transportation plan is to install special gates at the intersections along Howard/College so that CSX doesn’t have to blow its horn.
I guess the Coventry intersection already has the right kind of gate.
The Coventry crossing has no gate, I believe. I hkven’t been by in a while, but that’s my memory. I don’t thing it has a double gate, which is what would be required to waive the horn requirement.
No gate at Coventry, I live around the corner. Believe me, there’s a horn, or a whistle, or whatever they call it on a train.