Traffic

As Atlanta reels and ruminates over the Braves-tomahawks imbroglio, another lower key story recently came across the wire in the traffic world. With Pride Weekend on the horizon, the City of Atlanta made a point last week to tell its residents that the rainbow crosswalk at the Midtown Piedmont Ave. at 10th St. intersection would remain. But why would there be any question about that? Apparently, the Federal Highway Administration has deemed these crosswalk paint schemes below their safety standards.  » RELATED: Federal government says rainbow crosswalks could be unsafe Recently, the city of Ames, Iowa received a letter from the FHWA asking they remove their rainbow crosswalks because the colorful markings did not meet government safety standards. FHWA says that crosswalks can only use white paint.  “Crosswalk art has a potential to compromise pedestrian and motorist safety by interfering with, detracting from, or obscuring official traffic control devices. The art can also encourage road users, especially bicycles and pedestrians, to directly participate in the design, loiter in the street, or give reason to not vacate the street in an expedient or predictable manner,” FHWA wrote in a letter to an Ames official. The letter continued: “”It also creates confusion for motorists, pedestrians, and other jurisdictions who may see these markings and install similar crosswalk treatments in their cities. Allowing a non-compliant pavement marking to remain in place presents a liability concern for the City of Ames in the event of a pedestrian/vehicle or vehicle/vehicle collision.” While Atlanta hasn’t gotten a request yet, other cities besides Ames have. Ames declined to change the crosswalks back to their normal white gridding. When asked about it, the City of Atlanta gave a clear response. “While we have received no such request, Atlanta’s rainbow crosswalk is located on city-owned streets,” Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms’ spokesman Michael Smith told the AJC. “Much like glitter, the crosswalk is here to stay indefinitely. The Bottoms Administration wishes Atlanta a safe and fabulous Pride.” The assertions by the feds that these crosswalks are dangerous is questionable at best. First, the letter to Ames said that the rainbow colors interfere with a traffic control device. While technically true, the rainbow patterns do not hurt the functionality of a crosswalk; people can still walk across on them. The FHWA also stated that the rainbow crosswalks encourage people to loiter around the design and put themselves in danger. While these crosswalks draw attention, there are very few, if any, people who are actually taking dangerous steps to snap pictures or observe the designs. Tourism liability is a weak argument to force the designs to change. FHWA’s most erroneous claim is that the designs create confusion for those using them. If anything, changing a crosswalk design to something more brilliant and familiar draws more attention to there even being a crosswalk in the first place. Doesn’t the government want people aware of the crosswalk? White has a great contrast to pavement, but so do bright rainbow colors. People are mighty aware of where to cross the street at Piedmont and 10th. In defense of the federal government, this does create a slippery slope. How much should cities change standard road and sign designs to fit themes? That is a good question. But it is one that local jurisdictions should answer. That holds especially true if the street is locally maintained and not a U.S. highway. The public has much more of a say in how policy is made on granular issues like these when we go to city council meetings and petition our leaders. A pencil-pushing bureaucrat a thousand miles away shouldn’t affect policy of this kind on this level. And citizens’ powers against federal bureaucrats is far less than it is against city governments. Ames decided to keep its crosswalks and likely will not face recourse. Atlanta has preemptively done the same. Hopefully these and other cities like them will keep this fun aesthetic under control and not try to make each crosswalk become a statement or novelty. There are certainly cultural and practical benefits to repainting crosswalks, but changing too many of them is too costly. Rainbow crosswalks are a good thing of which there certainly can be too much. But forbidding them for being unsafe is laughable — and probably makes people want to jaywalk even more. » RELATED: Why did parts of Midtown Atlanta's $196K rainbow crosswalk disappear? Doug Turnbull, the PM drive Skycopter anchor for Triple Team Traffic on 95.5 WSB, is the Gridlock Guy. He also writes a traffic blog and hosts a podcast with Smilin’ Mark McKay on wsbradio.com. Contact him at Doug.Turnbull@coxmg.com .

Most commercials, promos, movies, or TV shows that portray traffic use sounds that have lots of horns. These stock sounds have enough horns that seemingly every fourth car would be laying on the horn. This dramatization of traffic is fairly far from reality and even further from the legal use of a car horn. » RELATED: Gridlock Guy: The keyless car craze goes mobile I started thinking about what exactly the law says about the proper use of a car horn. The instrument is obviously important, as every vehicle has one and state law says operating a car without a working horn is illegal. But there is a very specific parameter that people can use them. State law (O.C.G.A. 40-8-70 [2010]) is very clear and basic about how motorists should deploy their horns. “The driver of a motor vehicle shall, when it is reasonably necessary to ensure safe operation, give audible warning with his or her horn but shall not otherwise use such horn when upon a highway,” Georgia code says. So horns are meant to help ensure safety, nothing more. The reason I began analyzing the proper use of the horn is because of a recent bad experience. A car turned right in front of me and into my lane one Sunday morning on Clairmont Road in Brookhaven. I briefly hit my horn to both let them know I was close to hitting them and as a sign that doing so was inappropriate. I did nothing more. I then pulled into the next lane to the right and proceeded on at a slightly quicker speed. The car that I honked at pulled up even with me and stayed right at my speed for the next mile or so. I could tell they were upset, but decided to look straight ahead. I didn’t want to engage them and inflame the situation even more. I could see from the corner of my eye that the upset driver was looking at me and mouthing something. This surprised me, as I had only briefly hit the horn one time and done nothing else. So in analyzing what I did then and what the law says, the only illegal thing I may have done with the horn could have been intent. After the person had completed the tight maneuver in front of me, my hitting the horn may have been a bit late and I certainly did it at least partially out of aggravation. But I also, as a matter of safety, wanted to let them know that I was there. And letting them know in a corrective way about how dangerous that was could be seen as another matter of safety. Legal or not, they were mad and I tried to stay above reproach after the initial incident. It was over to me. Now let’s all think about how we all use our horns. Are we using them in the spirit of the law? Popping the horn to let a person know a light is green is appropriate. It gets traffic moving and keeps a car from being stopped in the middle of the road. Tooting the horn when a vehicle drifts into a lane is good, because the other driver can correct themselves before contact. When a car is driving the wrong way down a one-way street or blows through a red light, a stout horn push lets them know at the very least that they are in the wrong and more importantly that there could be oncoming, dangerous traffic. When the car horn becomes an extension of road rage, it becomes both a weapon and ineffective for its intended use. I have been criticized in the past for not using my horn enough; I was hesitant to, since I didn’t want to seem angry. Thinking back, I should have shed some of that trepidation and used my horn more. As long as the car horn is a tool for safety, it is a very useful thing.  » RELATED: Gridlock Guy: My ultimate pet peeve behind the wheel Doug Turnbull, the PM drive Skycopter anchor for Triple Team Traffic on 95.5 WSB, is the Gridlock Guy. He also writes a traffic blog and hosts a podcast with Smilin’ Mark McKay on wsbradio.com. Contact him at Doug.Turnbull@coxmg.com .

If the summer vacation wasn’t over before, it is now. With Labor Day having come and gone, all schools are back and many people have returned from their long-term vacations. Post-Labor Day Atlanta traffic has been bananas, with high volume in some areas reaching greater heights than seen in the spring. And Gwinnett and DeKalb commuters last Wednesday morning saw a new height in the High Occupancy Toll lane on I-85/southbound.  » RELATED: Are toll lanes really the answer to Atlanta’s traffic mess? WSB Triple Team Traffic’s Mark Arum first reported the record as it jumped to $16.60, then $16.90, then finally the height of $17. The previous record was $15.50 for the long trip from Old Peachtree Road to Shallowford Road. Most drivers, however, do not take trips that length in the lanes.  Arum (who is the original Gridlock Guy, by the way) easily noticed the record, he told me, because the lane regularly hit the $15.50 mark for over a year. He monitors the I-85 toll pricing each day, as that is his normal sector he covers on 95.5 WSB and because he updates the ticker information with toll pricing on Channel 2 Action News. The State Road and Tollway Authority (SRTA) adjusts the pricing in the lane, based on volume. So when the price crossed the $16 barrier, his brow furrowed: I-85 did not seem worse to any worse to him on Wednesday.  “It stunk. But it was a normal day,” Arum told 95.5 WSB listeners on The Von Haessler Doctrine daily talk show. There were big issues on I-285 earlier in the morning, which definitely affected I-85/southbound. But those kinds of things also happened in the $15.50 era. So what made Wednesday a record-breaking day? “If volume in that lane increases significantly, the toll system will try to put pricing in to try and keep that lane flowing,” SRTA executive director Chris Tomlinson explained to Channel 2 Action News. “Our goal is to try and keep that lane moving at an average (speed) of about 45 mph.” But maintaining that reliable speed is hard and there does come a point where no reasonable price will thwart enough people from the lanes to keep them at 45 mph. More than likely, SRTA realized that with a new traffic season underway and an ever-increasing population, they needed to attempt to set a slightly higher water mark to at least try to lighten the volume in the lane. SRTA (not GDOT) opened the I-85 Express Lanes in 2011 to a great outcry, and the board has changed certain pricing rules multiple times. People remain outraged that the formerly free H.O.V. lanes, which allowed in only carpools, buses, and motorcycles, suddenly cost money. With the now-toll lanes hitting a record price, the same complaints flashed brighter than brake lights again. “Why do we have to pay for a lane that our taxes already built? That’s theft!” There are several things wrong with that argument. First, the toll lane is technically less exclusive now than it was as an H.O.V. lane. Before, vehicles had to have multiple passengers or meet other requirements to drive in those lanes. Now, cars with three or more passengers and buses can still use the Peach Pass lanes on I-85 for free, as long as they change the toll mode to note that status on their Peach Pass accounts. Both they and any paying driver can use the lanes. That taxed lane is now open to more people. Another foil on these complaints is the idea that the money charged for the lane only goes to paying for it or that the lane was done being paid for. The money from the H.O.T. lane (and other new toll lanes around the state) is used for multiple transportation initiatives, as gas tax revenues have decreased with more fuel-efficient vehicles. Even though the gas tax has raised, Georgia needs more funding for roads that the growing population is wearing down. That wear and tear also means a road is never really done being totally paid for. Paving needs to be done on freeways every seven or so years; that money has to come from somewhere. Arum, the late Captain Herb Emory, and I met with SRTA officials when these H.O.T. lanes opened, and they said the purpose of the lanes was to relieve congestion in the general purpose lanes and provide a separate lane with more reliable trip times. Arum told Von Haessler that the lanes have provided some reprieve: “If the population had remained the same, they definitely would have helped.” Arum himself has used his Peach Pass on a Friday afternoon when heading north out of town and finds them totally worth the cost. Added capacity improves the ride for all commuters, even those who choose to ride for free in the general lanes. “The only people that should be mad about the H.O.T. lane are the people that used to carpool in the old H.O.V. lane,” Arum said, since I-85 carpools with only two passengers are not exempt from the cost. Some cities have tolls that literally are dozens of dollars for each trip. I had to pay a handful each time I crossed the Golden Gate Bridge into San Francisco on my June trip there. We still have far lighter tolls than most places. So while $17 is more than even I would pay on a normal day, and the increase in cost may seem arbitrary, it’s not really that bad. And drivers can skip the cost by choosing a different lane. This is the government using a free-market approach to a growing traffic problem.  » RELATED: New record toll rate set on I-85 express lanes in Gwinnett County Doug Turnbull, the PM drive Skycopter anchor for Triple Team Traffic on 95.5 WSB, is the Gridlock Guy. He also writes a traffic blog and hosts a podcast with Smilin’ Mark McKay on wsbradio.com. Contact him at Doug.Turnbull@coxinc.com.

Of the different automobile innovations in recent times, using an app to start a car may not be the most astonishing. But this convenience is starting to become standard on newer vehicles, as most major automakers offer apps that can connect to their newer models. The existence of such makes the hands-free experience much more seamless and eliminates the extra clutter of keys. » RELATED: Georgia’s distracted driving law turns 1: Has anything changed? Lincoln’s 2020 Aviator SUV  is one of the latest to offer this feature. Lincoln offers The Lincoln Way app, which already allows users to monitor tire pressure and oil life, look up navigation information, and schedule service appointments. That app will have an adjacent Phone As A Key app that allows some next-level features. This latest update will allow users to also start and lock their vehicles within a certain range of them. The driver will no longer need the key fob in their pocket, purse, or armrest to start it. This technology will work off of the Lincoln’s Bluetooth network within 130 feet of each automobile and then can work off of wifi or the cell network outside of that range. It will also allow different drivers to save seat and mirror settings. These features match perfectly with Lincoln’s luxury branding. But some may wonder about the safety concerns with such an effortless technology. First, only four digital keys are allowed per vehicle, and each one has its specific driver profile settings. This prevents anyone with that same app from syncing up to that car and taking off with it. There’s also a valet mode that allows others to drive it and automatically disables when the drivers gets back into it. There is a backup plan for if a driver loses their phone. The Aviator has a place to enter a code on the door to unlock it and another ignition code inside the car. Inputting codes on car door locks has been in place on cars since at least the 1990s. These passcodes are probably helpful things to bury somewhere in the wallet, just in case. Another safety concern that already exists for keyless-ignition, push-start vehicles is remembering to turn them off. This happened back in June to an Illinois couple, when they got out of their car and mistakenly left it running in their garage. The fumes seeped into their house and became a silent killer. Not only are fumes silent, but newer cars are far quieter than before. When drivers no longer have to physically take their keys out of the car, leaving it running is a possibility. Now with no physical push-start button requirement, that hazard potentially increases. Electric vehicles are almost silent, but also do not emit fumes. And arguably the most cutting edge of those, Tesla, has deployed this phone-centric innovation. “I absolutely love it,” Tesla owner Jon Godwin told the AJC. “Don’t have to pull out the phone and open the app either. Just walk up to the car and go.” Godwin said that he can also remote-start the car from anywhere in the world, if someone is borrowing it. And he can even honk the horn from the app, which may be more useful for practical joking than anything else. Godwin does explain one drawback: forgetting to bring along more analog technology. “Because I didn’t need the keys for the car, I kept forgetting to bring them to open other things! (My wife Charissa and I) ended up getting a keyless lock for the house, too. And I keep my keychain in the glovebox for any other time I may need them. But now I only reach for a set of keys once in a blue moon.” Godwin said that Tesla provides two sleek credit cards to use as physical keys, but he has only used them once in his 10 months of ownership. And the Tesla pretty much works like a glorified golf cart; its engine doesn’t actually turn on until the driver presses the pedal. And it turns off when it’s motionless and the driver exits. This means that it won’t just stay activated by mistake and run out of battery. App-starting a vehicle may not solve many traffic issues, but the convenience makes the driving experience better. Drivers potentially can take better care of their vehicles with all of the diagnostic data available in the app. They can can transfer navigation destinations between the app and the digital dash infotainment center (which also is available via Apple CarPlay and Android Auto with other compatible mapping apps). And being able to start and lock the car a bit quicker can at least shorten the commute by a few seconds. As long as people remain mindful enough to turn off their cars and aren’t using the app with their hands behind the wheel, there really aren’t many downsides to phones replacing keyfobs.  » RELATED: Don't make this huge mistake with your car key fob Doug Turnbull, the PM drive Skycopter anchor for Triple Team Traffic on 95.5 WSB, is the Gridlock Guy. He also writes a traffic blog and hosts a podcast with Smilin’ Mark McKay on wsbradio.com. Contact him at Doug.Turnbull@coxinc.com.

Last week’s column on e-scooters galvanized plenty of reactions. Most people emailed in with their ire about scooter riders and their leaving the electric devices all over the place like litter. But one Twitter exchange took a more defensive approach. User and reader Marian Lou wondered why faulty street design wasn’t part of my list of grievances. She suggested to her followers that Darin Givens from ThreadATL be allowed some time to share his views. Givens and I were both intrigued by the idea.  » RELATED: GDOT completes Cedar Ridge Road Bridge replacement two days early I wanted to learn exactly what street design problems existed and how fixing them would improve the commute, so I reached out to Givens, who co-founded ThreadATL. This organization is a group that advocates for smart design and planning policy in the City of Atlanta.  Givens started his advocacy after harrowing experiences pushing his son in a stroller on Ponce de Leon Ave. in Virginia Highlands. Sidewalks were in bad shape and drivers turned angrily in front of them in crosswalks. He moved into the City of Atlanta from Cobb County.  'I thought when I moved to the city, it would be pretty easy to get around,' Givens recalled, thinking that walking in the city certainly would be easier than even using mass transit. 'And I found out that just wasn't the case and that drivers were often pretty hostile to people who were not in cars.' So Givens started studying urban design as a hobby and began understanding what policies work in other cities. Then he began pushing for these types of plans in Atlanta. One of the biggest problems Givens sees is simply with the inefficient use of space on and around the roads. 'We cannot widen these streets really any more, because there are buildings up against them. So what we need to do is rethink how we use the width of these streets.' Givens noted the undoubted spatial efficiency of putting 50 people on one MARTA bus, which takes many vehicles off the roads and out of parking spaces. But ThreadATL's main focus is even simpler: optimizing street design to allow for safer pedestrian and bike-use. Overall, they want to reduce trips in cars.  Let's stop there - you've probably heard this urbanism train of thought before. Reducing car trips by taking to mass transit is a great goal in Atlanta, but the citizens and MARTA still have a lot of changes to make to make MARTA more viable to many. Givens and his group espouse another transportation strategy that gets less press.  'I feel like the biggest thing we can do is to reduce car speeds in this city, one way or the other,' Givens said, stating he and other advocates in this realm think all city street speed limits should lower to 25 miles per hour. 'The lower the speed you're going in a car, the less of a chance you have for that impact with a pedestrian or e-scooter or bicycle rider to be a fatal impact.'  We cover that concept every back to school season, as AAA data shows that pedestrians are far more likely to die at a 35 mph impact than 25.  Givens thinks the city could be better stewards of transportation funds. Instead of spending $33 million on the Northside Drive pedestrian bridge, he said they should spend money on smaller street improvements, such as narrowing vehicle lanes. 'Wider car lanes generally result in higher car speeds. In narrower lanes, drivers can drive more slowly and carefully.' This adjustment, Givens said, would then allow for construction of bike (and e-scooter) lanes without taking vehicle lanes away or impossibly widening the roads.  Givens looked out his condo window onto Ralph McGill Blvd., as he talked. He said the road is four, wide lanes and passing vehicles take advantage of that space. 'Every night, I mean, it's like they are drag racing out there. Cars are just flying out there. And this is a street that my son walks on.' Givens' point is that narrowing lanes will reduce those speeds, make the road more multi-modal (different types of transportation), and make the environment safer for pedestrians.  Givens and ThreadATL not only appeal to local leaders and administrators, but also neighborhood associations. Some of those neighborhood groups have been vehemently against bike lanes and other more urbanist measures, because of the traffic they fear such changes will create. Atlanta's adherence to car culture could be the biggest obstacle to reducing car trips and trying new ways to commute. But there are difficulties in making the switch. MARTA doesn't go a lot of places and can take longer than driving. Bicycle lanes don't exist in many areas, making rides less safe. And riding a bike in general is not everyone's cup of tea. Walking takes a longer time and more energy and sidewalks are not in great shape at all.  This is why Givens thinks that Atlanta could better spend transportation money and divert more to building 'complete streets' with narrower lanes, bike lanes, smart traffic lights, HAWK pedestrian signals, and more. Having these would at least encourage people to make some changes more easily.  In this same vein, Georgia Commute Options' 'Cear the Deck' campaign this week urges employers to sign up and allow employees to work remotely or to promote carpooling. They do this in an effort to reduce single vehicle occupancy. Last year's campaign yielded over 1,200 parking spaces saved.  The efforts and passion of Givens and people and organizations like him are necessary. Atlanta simply cannot grow and only cater to cars. Both the economy and the environment demand us to be inventive with our travels. But we have to be willing to take that risk. On another note, we cannot only advocate for travel outside of cars. The new and the old have to coexist to move the most people, the most safely, and in the least amount of time.  » RELATED: Work at I-285 and Ga. 400 means traffic hassles in north metro Atlanta Doug Turnbull, the PM drive Skycopter anchor for Triple Team Traffic on 95.5 WSB, is the Gridlock Guy. He also writes a traffic blog and hosts a podcast with Smilin’ Mark McKay on wsbradio.com. Contact him at Doug.Turnbull@coxinc.com.