| Author |
Message |
    
romatc
Citizen
Username: Romatc
Post Number: 22
Registered: 6-2002
| | Posted on Saturday, July 1, 2006 - 1:38 pm: | 
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I'd like to know who was the rocket scientist who timed the traffic light @ that intersection. Traffic backs up on Boyden Ave. big time. Could you have made it any shorter for the Boyden Ave. traffic? Plus they have the stop line before the fire house (which makes sense) but really an extra green minute for Boyden Ave. IMHO would elevate some of the back up. Just my 2 cents worth and just venting...lol. |
Joan
Supporter
Username: Joancrystal
Post Number: 7697
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Saturday, July 1, 2006 - 2:03 pm: |
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Check out the discussion on Mostly Maplewood for more information/venting on this topic. |
tom
Citizen
Username: Tom
Post Number: 5207
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Saturday, July 1, 2006 - 2:42 pm: |
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I can't believe this still isn't fixed. With the pool open it's even more imporant than it was last time this came up. |
les
Citizen
Username: Les
Post Number: 123
Registered: 6-2001
| | Posted on Saturday, July 1, 2006 - 4:07 pm: |
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It continues to be horrendous. Trying to get to/from the pool is beyond frustrating. And, I feel sorry for those folks who live on the Boyden Parkways still. They have literally 5 seconds of green to get out, which is impossible because the cars trying to navigate Boyden Avenue are blocking the intersection during that time. There are too many people running the red lights from every direction - it's a mess! |
cody
Citizen
Username: Cody
Post Number: 1033
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Saturday, July 1, 2006 - 4:39 pm: |
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That whole section of Springfield Ave. is messed up big-time. I know Maplewood took over that section of the avenue to slow down traffic, but I didn't realize they meant to bring it to a dead standstill! I have to drive that stretch to get to work; I'm looking into alternate routes to avoid the Burnett/Springfield headache. |
Joanne G
Citizen
Username: Joanne
Post Number: 282
Registered: 10-2004
| | Posted on Saturday, July 1, 2006 - 7:19 pm: |
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On Friday I attended a really fascinating workshop, for traffic engineers, on traffic management theory. Actually one possible reason for the timing you mention is to persuade people who can drive another way that they really don't need to use this particular traffic route, and eventually they will take themselves out of the picture. What I find hilarious about this argument is that many motorists are such slow and pig-headed learners when it comes to deciding/changing routes, that they won't learn in time and won't use public transport (if it's available).
Perhaps you need to stage a Residents Reclaiming? Check out http://www.traffictamers.com/ |
las
Citizen
Username: Las
Post Number: 1992
Registered: 10-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, July 1, 2006 - 7:31 pm: |
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The producer of the program doesn't even own a car! 
But he did create the Walking School Bus, so maybe he's got something here... |
John James Leuchs Jr
Citizen
Username: Clairvoyant
Post Number: 101
Registered: 8-2005
| | Posted on Saturday, July 1, 2006 - 7:42 pm: |
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Much worse than pool traffic is rush hour traffic. I gave up trying to use that intersection anytime from 7:00 - 9:00 AM and 4:30 - 6:00 PM. i drive along Prospect now and make a left hand turn down one of the side streets before Tuscan Rd. and go around the park, avoiding that intersection altogether. I then rejoin Boyden Ave. after Seth Boyden school. But for those of you going to the pool, you have no choice. |
romatc
Citizen
Username: Romatc
Post Number: 23
Registered: 6-2002
| | Posted on Saturday, July 1, 2006 - 8:10 pm: |
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Hi Joan, Could you post a link to the traffic light issue? Thanks, Roma |
mantram
Citizen
Username: Mantram
Post Number: 247
Registered: 8-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, July 1, 2006 - 9:54 pm: |
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On a related note -- does anyone know when exactly Boyden is scheduled to be repaved? The potholes are horrific, not to mention the now non-existent markings that are outrightly dangerous. |
Glock 17
Citizen
Username: Glock17
Post Number: 1339
Registered: 7-2005
| | Posted on Saturday, July 1, 2006 - 10:14 pm: |
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This is the intersection where Quick Chek is located? |
sac
Supporter
Username: Sac
Post Number: 3585
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Saturday, July 1, 2006 - 10:21 pm: |
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Yes |
Joanne G
Citizen
Username: Joanne
Post Number: 284
Registered: 10-2004
| | Posted on Saturday, July 1, 2006 - 10:49 pm: |
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Las, I've PL'd |
tom
Citizen
Username: Tom
Post Number: 5213
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Sunday, July 2, 2006 - 11:00 am: |
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Joann G, in principle that's a good point; I avoid that intersection myself, by several different routes depending on where I'm trying to go. But they're all residential, and one road in particular takes a big hit from impatient people cutting through. Wouldn't it be better to pull traffic away from residential streets and onto less populated stretches like Boyden between the pool and springfield? |
Joan
Supporter
Username: Joancrystal
Post Number: 7713
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Sunday, July 2, 2006 - 4:11 pm: |
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Joanne:
Another problem is that persons living on a dead end street rely on that stretch of Boyden Avenue to get to/from their homes when they are traveling by motor vehicle. They truly don't have a choice.
Roma:
Sorry. I am clueless when it comes to creating links. Check the archives in the Mostly Maplewood section of the board. |
Joanne G
Citizen
Username: Joanne
Post Number: 285
Registered: 10-2004
| | Posted on Sunday, July 2, 2006 - 5:24 pm: |
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Not living in the area, I truly can't contribute to the discussion constructively - and reading the other thread, I can see that the traffic engineers in your area aren't thinking along the lines that I suggested. (I found it easy to locate that thread, simply by going to Mostly Maplewood and scrolling through the list of headers)
The workshop I attended on Friday was by a person who excels at helping people reclaim residential streets from the dominance of fast and heavy motor traffic. Doing a little further research, in some ways you have it stacked against you as 'urban sprawl' and the modern definition of road use seem to have come from New Jersey in the 1920s and 30s!! (So it's harder to shift the mental paradigms)
However some modern observers of traffic behaviour suggest that to make things go faster, you actually need to make them actually move slower, by making the motorist do counter-intuitive driving things that are actually safer for all road users and therefore more efficient all around. This includes not using your vehicle for non-essential trips (perhaps car-pooling, using public tranpsort, other modes of transport or walking), bringing facilities closer to residents so they don't need to drive (the activity hub idea, where all essential social and economic activity takes place within 10 mins from your home; leaving home 10 mins earlier to avoid the nasty clog in the problematic traffic light zone (easier to wait with fewer cars around); roundabouts instead of lights; no kerbs or traffic signs at all, not even a parking bay...
In my immediate home town (where I live) there are just under 5 thousand people spread out including on farms, and many don't have cars. Still we have a major highway bisecting our town, and many residents are truckers who leave their semis parked on the outskirts while they are home. We don't have paved walking areas and decent streetlighting let alone decent traffic calming devices, for the 5 minutes each day it gets hairy or the three days a year the streets clog with through-traffic. Nearby (where I work) are towns of up to 100 000 people - totally different driving behaviour: no-one looks further than the next car, no-one looks out for children on the road, everyone curses the stop lights and the potholes (no-one actually reports when the lights and holes need repair) etc.
The traffic engineers have different issues to work with, but they can't control human behaviour so the trick is to make human behaviour work for them - make people choose to do something different. Sounds like you have the same set of human problems - and you can do something about it, without necessarily relying on the timing of lights. It's about getting motorists to become more aware of what's happening outside their cars so they are more patient with light-cycles (20 seconds won't really affect your entire trip. Maybe the thing to do is leave a couple of kids' bikes by the lights for a couple of rush hours. Then maybe four people sit next to the intersection and play cards. Someone sit and read a newspaper. Hold a tea party on another corner of that intersection. Bring back the awareness that it's more than a place for speeding cars to zip through lights. Traffic will begin to re-regulate its speed more efficiently and more safely.
Sorry - didn't mean to get so heavy...just a rebel pedestrian at heart |
John Caffrey
Citizen
Username: Jerseyjack
Post Number: 355
Registered: 11-2005
| | Posted on Sunday, July 2, 2006 - 8:14 pm: |
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Joanne, Your traffic engineer reminds me of Jane Jacobs who attended such a meeting of experts on city planning. One guy explained that city plans were perfectly o.k. The problem was that the people living in the cities weren't behaving like the text books said they were supposed to. |
tom
Citizen
Username: Tom
Post Number: 5215
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Sunday, July 2, 2006 - 8:39 pm: |
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I'm inclined to think that the timing of this paricular light isn't a result of any deep urban planning, just carelessness in setting it up. |
3ringale
Citizen
Username: Threeringale
Post Number: 281
Registered: 1-2006
| | Posted on Sunday, July 2, 2006 - 9:06 pm: |
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I drive through this intersection at 5:30 AM, on my way to work and never have a problem.
Cheers |
romatc
Citizen
Username: Romatc
Post Number: 24
Registered: 6-2002
| | Posted on Friday, July 7, 2006 - 8:58 pm: |
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You guys make me laugh. Tom, you hit the nail right on head period. |
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