AT MANY INTERSECTIONS IN CHICAGO, Simply Crossing the Street is Downright Dangerous!
PEDESTRIAN CROSSING DEATHS UP IN 2008!
Despite enhanced safety measures to safeguard pedestrians crossing the streets of Chicago, crossing fatalities were up last year across the city.
Tracy Swartz, Reporter for The Chicago Tribune and The Red Eye Newspapers, wrote today that 56 people died crossing the street in Chicago in 2008 - up from 49 in 2007.
According to Brian Steele of the Chicago Department of Transportation, heavy foot traffic crossing increasingly-busy vehicle traffic is the culprit. But he is also concerned with inadequate pavement markings, poor signage, and large areas of arterial road construction in some Chicago Neighborhoods.
Walk Score research, cited in Swartz's story, calls Chicago the fourth most walked city in the U.S. Only San Francisco, Boston, and New York City ranked higher.
Red Eye and Swartz conducted an analysis of pedestrian fatality data from the Illinois Department of Transportation, and found multiple fatal crashes along Madison Street, Ashland Avenue, Lake Shore Drive, and Stony Island Avenue in Chicago.
They isolated one north side pedestrian trouble spot at the intersection of Chicago and Cicero Avenues, in the North Austin Neighborhood of Chicago. Two pedestrians were killed in separate incidents at this intersection last year, despite the installation of a red light camera nearly two years ago. A couple of major CTA routes cross that intersection, and the corner draws constant traffic on weekdays because of a nearby elementary school and a Cook County Health Clinic.
In 2008, the Chicago Office of Emergency Management tallied 29 complaints about the intersection - potholes, faded street markings, and poorly-timed street lights and traffic signals.
Complaints on intersection safety, as well as need for repairs, goes to the Chicago Department of Transportation (CDOT). As a solution to dangerous intersections, they often repaint crosswalk markings, and add more visible street signs. At some intersections, "Pedestrian Islands" have been constructed so those crossing the street have a comparatively safe place to wait if they can't make it all the way across before the signal changes.
Another safety measure involves "Countdown Timers" before the green light turns red, and the "Walk" signal becomes "Don't Walk."
Here on the North Side, in the Lincoln Square Neighborhood of Chicago where Dean's Team World Headquarters is located, crossing Western Avenue at various points between Montrose Avenue north to Foster Street has become a tightly and dangerously timed race against lights, often way after the sun sets each day.
DEAN MOSS & DEAN'S TEAM CHICAGO
