Thomas MacMIllan Photo
Gustafson (left) and Hausladen.
After a temporary guerrilla crosswalk appeared on Whitney Avenue at Audubon Street, Erin Gustafson looked out her office window and saw people crossing safely as cars slowed to a stop. A plan is in the works to make that temporary phenomenon a permanent reality.
The crosswalk Gustafson saw at Audubon and Whitney disappeared soon after it appeared, removed by city officials concerned it was making the street unsafe for pedestrians. Safe-streets advocates had painted the crosswalk in the middle of the night without public permission.
The vision of what was possible lingered. It inspired Gustafson to team up with downtown activist Doug Hausladen and try to bring the crosswalk back, permanently this time.
And guess what? It turns out city officials have been cooking up pretty much the same plan on their own for one of downtown’s most contentious crossings.
Gustafson, who works on Whitney at the Yale Office of International Students and Scholars, and Hausladen, who manages a property nearby, Tuesday submitted a project proposal to the city. The pair used the Project Request Form in the new Complete Streets infrastructure design manual to petition for a raised crosswalk with a blinking light at the intersection.
The city Complete Streets Manual includes a Project Request Form that anyone can use to request an improvement to car, bike, or pedestrian infrastructure. The Gustafson/Hausladen proposal goes beyond the simple two-page form. It includes a title page, table of contents, and appendices with photographs and testimonials from pedestrians. See it here.
Meanwhile, city interim traffic czar Jim Travers said he and City Engineer Dick Miller are already at work with a consultant seeking a pedestrian solution for the location.
All parties have one idea in common: a pedestrian-triggered blinking yellow light. Such a device was recently installed on Canal Street. It doesn’t stop cars, but it gives drivers a heads up that people are crossing.
Canal Street crossing.
While the corner of Audubon and Whitney has for years been the subject of complaints from pedestrians, the issue was taken to another level earlier this month when a group of guerrilla street painters took matters into their own hands. In the dark of night, they installed a crosswalk of their own, stretching from the north corner of Audubon to the west side of Whitney, in front of Gourmet Heaven.
The action prompted a spirited public debate, and also drew the criticism of the local alderwoman, Bitsie Clark. She said the crosswalk would make the area more dangerous, not less, because it would give pedestrians a false sense of security at what is inherently a dangerous spot to cross. Travers saw it similarly; he ordered city workers to power-wash away the crosswalk.
One afternoon this week, Gustafson and Hausladen stopped by the intersection to talk about their vision, as pedestrians braved speeding cars to cross Whitney.
Gustafson began by saying that she is responsible for one of the oldest of the several SeeClickFix tickets calling for a crosswalk at Audubon and Whitney. Her handle on the site: “10 year walker.”
It’s now 12 years that she’s been walking from her home in Wooster Square to her office on Whitney. She crosses the street at Audubon multiple times a day.
When the guerrilla crosswalk appeared a couple weeks ago, Gustafson saw that it worked immediately. People heading west on the south side of Audubon crossed over to use the crosswalk. They “coalesced” at the north corner, waited there, and cars stopped for them, she said.
“I was so excited to see everyone doing it safely,” she said.
She called up Hausladen, the departing chair of the Downtown/Wooster Square Community Management Team. The two of them set to crafting a permanent solution.
Hausladen, through the management team, had heard several years of complaints about the intersection. He also works for a company that manages 55 Whitney Ave., at the north corner of Audubon and Whitney. He saw for himself how hard it is to get across the street.
There are several obstacles to the introduction of a crosswalk, Gustafson and Hausladen explained. The main problem: The slight rise in Whitney Avenue over the Farmington Canal Trail just south of the intersection prevents drivers from seeing crossers until they’re nearly on them. That factor is made worse by the fact that Whitney Avenue at Grove Street, south of Audubon, starts off wide before it crests that small hill. The width encourages cars to speed, Hausladen said. The road feels wide and welcomes acceleration. Many of the drivers are heading to the highway or otherwise anxious to get out of town, he said.
Hausladen suggested putting in angled parking on one side of Whitney between Grove and the crest of the canal hill. That would narrow the street and reduce speeds, and increase parking.
Meanwhile, Audubon is designed to be a different kind of street from broad Whitney: a narrow lane with brick details and a curve designed to slow cars. Any crosswalk therefore has to deal with the fundamental mismatch of a quiet pedestrian-friendly road meeting a major artery out of downtown.
Some people have suggested putting in the crosswalk at the top of the hill over the canal, Gustafson and Hausladen said. That’s not going to work, they said. For one thing, there’s a big pipe erupting out of the sidewalk like a breaching humpback whale (visible in photo above). For another, no one walking down Audubon will go 100 yards out of their way to cross the street when they’re hungry for lunch at Gourmet Heaven or Moe’s.
Canal Street crossing.
So what’s to be done?
Gustafson said she’d like to see a permanent crosswalk where the guerrillas put one, equipped with a pedestrian activated blinking yellow light like the one on Canal Street.
Travers later offered the same idea. He described it as “something that creates a little ‘I’m here!’” to allow pedestrians to draw attention to themselves when crossing.
Gustafson said she likes that idea better than a simple sign indicating a crosswalk. There’s one of those at Court Street where it meets Orange, and drivers ignore it all the time, even when she stands there pointing at it, she said.
Putting the crosswalk in with red brick would further highlight it for drivers, she said. The submitted proposal calls for a raised crosswalk.
Hausladen said the package he and Gustafson put together doesn’t even get into the more intensive overhauls that could happen at the intersection, like bump-outs to narrow the crossing distance for pedestrians.
Travers said bump-outs are being considered by the traffic department.
Travers said he cannot offer a timeframe for completion of a new crosswalk at the intersection. He said the city had been working on fixing the spot, even before the guerrillas forced the issue. “We’ll still continue to push this forward,” he said. The traffic department is “committed to safe walkability” throughout the city, he said.