The Safety Mirage
Via Brownstoner, I couldn’t help be horrified by the above aesthetic outrage, which seems like some sinister prelude to paving with asphalt (or else the paint fumes are getting to the crew). But I was struck by the comments: People really do seem to sincerely believe that there is a need for yellow dividing lines on presumably low-speed (particularly since they’re Belgian-blocked) streets, as if the mere fact that they were there was proof enough of their rationale and safety.
It’s amazing how our instinct fools us here. But, sorry folks, per your comments, yellow dividing lines aren’t going to keep your children safe, aren’t going to prevent crashes, aren’t going to magically keep drivers from swerving over into the other lane — the only effect that they’re going to have on driver behavior is to increase their speed (and hence raise danger for everyone) and even narrow their passing distance, as they grow confident in the delineation of their space. Dividing lines have absolutely no place on narrow, slow-moving, pedestrian-crowded urban streets. Save it for the highway.
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This entry was posted on Friday, April 16th, 2010 at 7:04 am and is filed under Traffic Engineering, Traffic safety. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
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April 16th, 2010 at 2:19 pm
Yellow lines on a street like that do more to indicate that passing and parking aren’t allowed on that street than for traffic separation. The yellow lines are probably more aesthetically pleasing than yellow or red curbs…
April 16th, 2010 at 2:42 pm
The point about stripes is good but this case might not be the most egregious example.
If other blocks of this street are one-way or if nearby streets like it are typically one-way, the stripes work better than a sign to counter the likely assumption that this street too is one-way.
April 19th, 2010 at 2:49 pm
Or the double yellow lines could be used to delineate one lane in each direction and reinforce a parking prohibition on both curbs.
April 27th, 2010 at 9:39 am
Small streets like this suffer more from double-parkers and idling trucks, for which the double yellow line is practically ignored by through traffic by necessity.
May 2nd, 2010 at 12:54 pm
NYC streets weirdly change from one way to two way, with most cross streets (like this one), usually one way. The signage is usually very poor. The double yellow line is crucial to telling cars that this is a two way street.
May 3rd, 2010 at 7:18 am
great post as usual!