Davis Square Streetscape Meetings Scheduled for June, July, August

[joelbikesalot.livejournal.com]

http://www.somervillema.gov/news/davis-square-streetscape-meetings-scheduled-june-july-august

Comments

[boblothrope.livejournal.com]

I probably can't make the meetings, but I have two suggestions for the main Davis traffic light:

1) Add transit priority. This would be easy for the busway -- just add a loop detector, and add pavement markings/signage to show drivers where to pull up when they're ready for a green. On the Holland St and College Ave approaches, it would require getting the T to add a transmitter to buses, so that could be a future project.

2) Get rid of the all-way walk light, and let people cross with the parallel green. Most people do this anyway. Pedestrians shouldn't have to face a don't walk light when it's perfectly safe to cross, especially where there's no cross traffic like at the Day Street crosswalk. It would also save a heck of a lot of red light time, which would reduce the typical huge backups that delay mass transit and cause cut-through traffic on small residential streets.

[ringrose.livejournal.com]

The cycle already includes a bus light, right before the walk signal.

[ron_newman]

But what it should do is turn the bus light green as soon as a bus pulls up to it, interrupting whatever part of the cycle it is currently in.

[ringrose.livejournal.com]

I'd worry about false positives there when a bus is loading passengers near the exit.

[ron_newman]

True, it would need to be set up so that the light triggers only when the bus passes beyond a certain line.

[pywaket.livejournal.com]

God, yes, this! At the very least, shorten the right turn light from Highland onto College to the same length as the straight through light and make Highland legal to cross when the red is on. I think that's got to be the least pedestrian-friendly light in Somerville, with only about 20 seconds of walk time (and only 5 seconds when it's legal to start walking) in the entire 4 minute cycle. *Everyone* jaywalks there. This would also allow crossing College when the light from that direction is red, which it isn't now because most of the time, the green right turn light prevents that.