First the disclaimer, this is speculation. So why speculate? Because there are a lot of pedestrains killed in this State, far more then what could be considered “normal”. And if I am near right I have opened the door for someone to sue SHA for not following the best engineering practices as required by State law. And maybe they will reexamine their polices and realize for the same money they could be a lot more pedestrian friendly/accommodating, which translates to saving lives.
The first topic, the pedestrian call button or the beg button or road engineers playing “Mother May I” with pedestrains. This is the way it’s always been done so we really don’t question the user interface but seriously imagine calling for an elevator and the button you pushed does nothing, no click, no light, just nothing. The indicator of what floor the elevator is on does not move . Now ask yourself how long would you wait before taking the stairs to go a short distance? I really have to ask why we expect pedestrains to behave differently? If a button acts like it is not working, we find a alternate way to cross, that is human behavior.
I found some helpful advice on dealing with ped call buttons from this site.
When you push the button, a call is put into the signal controller to let it know a pedestrian is waiting. The signal may not change immediatelySometimes when the button is pushed there is not enough time for the signal controller to activate the walk phase. You should wait one more cycle for the “walk” sign. If the “walk” sign doesn’t come on the second time around, the signal is probably not working properly. You must use extreme caution when crossing under these conditions.
Well the first line should say “The signal well hardly ever change immediately.” That’s because if peds are the ones calling for a signal change they must endure a prequeue phase before anything is noticeable. They used to require this of cars as well, till they discovered that a high percentage of drivers ran the red lights, thinking the light was broken. Why they expect pedestrains to behave differently I will never comprehend. (Note: that the time for the prequeue was moved to after the crossing phase to control the frequency of crossing phases. This is for my engineer friends who imagine disastrous results if we let peds stop traffic whenever they want, relax, you still have control over the frequency. )
In the second paragraph “there is not enough time”, really. in this day and age of electronics? This is like saying, sorry we can’t open elevator doors if the elevator is already on the floor. The elevator must first go up and back down and only when the elevator first lands can it open doors and you get in. But note this issue would be solved if ped lights came on automatically. (See How Portland is doing it.)
Also note you are told you will have no idea if things are working or not. That’s just crazy! Just because things have always been the way does not mean that is the way they HAVE to work. Imagine pressing a elevator button that doesn’t light up, what are you going to do? Bang on it several times? If a button was designed like that on purpose you wouldn’t expect it to last very long with all that banging, right? My observations there are a lot of ped call buttons that no longer function. So not only do we have a poorly designed user interface we have one that is designed on purpose to wear out quickly and no routine procedure of maintenance (you have to call these things in to be fixed so they tend to stay broken for a very long time because they are a near useless thing to get fixed.)
All that was just problems pedestrains have in trying to get a crossing signal, now add to that a T intersection and the boy crossed against the light possibly as shown here:
If you are asking what light, well that’s the way they design T intersections so the light is not visible to pedestrains on one side of the street. The problem is then compounded by not having the ped signal go on automatically when appropriate and only having one crosswalk and the ped “beg” buttons that insist that only peds should endure a prequeue phase and no feedback that the button has been pressed or even working at all. The whole thing fails proper user interface design. Nothing of this century comes even close to this poorly designed interface so why do we accept this for pedestrian safety?
All this really sounds like stacking the deck against safe pedestrian crossings in this state. But it must be all the pedestrains fault on why we have such a high pedestrian fatality rate.
Again note these are just possibilities and not the facts in this case. But I for one am tired of just discounting this stuff to always pedestrian error. If there is a lot of motorist error they fix the problem with the road design but with pedestrians we are content that it is their own fault. Why is that exactly?
HYATTSVILLE, Md. (WUSA) — Cpl. Henry Tippett, with the Prince George’s County Police Department, said a 15-year-old boy is dead after he was struck by a sport utility vehicle in Hyattsville, Md.
Tippett said police were called to the 7600 block of Landover Road, near the intersection of Dodge Park Road around 7 p.m.,
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https://www.wusa9.com/rss/local_article.aspx?storyid=131569
§ 2-602. Public policy.
The General Assembly finds that it is in the public interest for the State to include enhanced transportation facilities for pedestrians and bicycle riders as an essential component of the State’s transportation system, and declares that it is the policy of the State that:
(1) Access to and use of transportation facilities by pedestrians and bicycle riders shall be considered and best engineering practices regarding the needs of bicycle riders and pedestrians shall be employed in all phases of transportation planning, including highway design, construction, reconstruction, and repair as well as expansion and improvement of other transportation facilities;
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