Wednesday, September 08, 2004
Construction Project Traffic Direction
My day job keeps me aware of constant changing traffic conditions on our city streets. One increasing problem I notice it construction projects that have wrong directions for traffic. I am not talking about inadequate signs, or inexperienced people directing traffic, I am talking about signs and traffic directions that are WRONG!
For example on my way to work this morning I had to pass through a construction zone, that has been there for weeks. It was at the time where it was not quite daylight yet. The orange construction signs that tell you which lane is closed, indicated the left lane is closed, that traffic should move to the right. Succeeding signs all the way along indicated move right.
But looking ahead in the distance, the electronic arrow indicated keep left, and in fact that was the lane that was open for traffic. I was the fifth vehicle in line of a group, and I was kept busy dodging debris from broken barriers, cones and metal signs. The lead vehicles, one of which was a truck had no idea what lane to be in and was hitting those items as they tried to figure out where they should be.
The debris of flattened traffic cones was spread over a considerable distance. Workers at the site paid little attention to what was going on traffic wise.
Yes drivers often travel too fast through construction sites, and this may have been a contributing factor here. But all the signs were dead wrong. The electronic arrows (of which there was only one) were correct. My assumption is that the construction crew was changing from one lane to another to complete their work. In other words, closing one lane and opening the other.
Well supervisors, get this. There is a procedure for doing that. While the signs are indicating wrong, use a guide truck to lead the traffic through, while the signs are changed. That's right, the one that was sitting over in the middle of the project safe and sound away from the traffic with the solid bar flashing. Between the arrow that could be seen in the distance, and the one on the lead truck it would have been safe.
This is getting all to common. It is the third time this summer that I have observed signs directing traffic the wrong way. Suppose this is another reason our insurance rates are increasing?
This work by NSCAVE is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License
My day job keeps me aware of constant changing traffic conditions on our city streets. One increasing problem I notice it construction projects that have wrong directions for traffic. I am not talking about inadequate signs, or inexperienced people directing traffic, I am talking about signs and traffic directions that are WRONG!
For example on my way to work this morning I had to pass through a construction zone, that has been there for weeks. It was at the time where it was not quite daylight yet. The orange construction signs that tell you which lane is closed, indicated the left lane is closed, that traffic should move to the right. Succeeding signs all the way along indicated move right.
But looking ahead in the distance, the electronic arrow indicated keep left, and in fact that was the lane that was open for traffic. I was the fifth vehicle in line of a group, and I was kept busy dodging debris from broken barriers, cones and metal signs. The lead vehicles, one of which was a truck had no idea what lane to be in and was hitting those items as they tried to figure out where they should be.
The debris of flattened traffic cones was spread over a considerable distance. Workers at the site paid little attention to what was going on traffic wise.
Yes drivers often travel too fast through construction sites, and this may have been a contributing factor here. But all the signs were dead wrong. The electronic arrows (of which there was only one) were correct. My assumption is that the construction crew was changing from one lane to another to complete their work. In other words, closing one lane and opening the other.
Well supervisors, get this. There is a procedure for doing that. While the signs are indicating wrong, use a guide truck to lead the traffic through, while the signs are changed. That's right, the one that was sitting over in the middle of the project safe and sound away from the traffic with the solid bar flashing. Between the arrow that could be seen in the distance, and the one on the lead truck it would have been safe.
This is getting all to common. It is the third time this summer that I have observed signs directing traffic the wrong way. Suppose this is another reason our insurance rates are increasing?
This work by NSCAVE is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License
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