Aliyya Swaby Photo
Before crossing Olive at Greene Street to get to his car, Giovanni Zinn pressed a button at the intersection to flash a message to passing drivers.
Zinn, the city engineer, watched rectangular amber LED lights begin to flash above the button. He was showing off a newly-installed “rectangular rapid flash beacon” (RRFB) — a low-budget signal to help slow down hectic traffic on Olive.
City officials promised Wooster Square neighbors they would bring traffic-calming solutions to the street after 81-year-old Dolores Dogolo was struck and killed by a driver at Olive and Greene last October. Zinn and city transit chief Doug Hausladen rolled out the idea of pedestrian-activated beacon lights at a community meeting in the spring, and recently set them up at three locations on Olive.
Powered by solar energy, the LED lights are set between a large arrow sign pointing to the painted crosswalk and a pedestrian crosswalk sign. Two sets are installed at Olive and Court Streets, and one set is installed at Olive and Greene.
Wooster Square Alder Aaron Greenberg said the lights are on his walking route home from downtown. “I feel safer walking. I feel safer driving,” he said. “The big change is that it’s really starting to change behavior — where pedestrians are crossing, how people are driving.”
A police investigation into Dogolo’s death found the driver not at fault for the collision last year, in part because Dogolo was “crossing diagonally and was not within the unmarked crosswalk at the moment of collision,” according to a police release. (Dogolo’s family members criticized that report during a later meeting.)
Greenberg said the new RRFBs are starting “to change behavior — where pedestrians are crossing, how people are driving. … People I’ve talked to are really noticing the difference.”
The first RRFB was installed a couple of years ago on Canal Street behind the Grove Street Cemetery, Hausladen said. The signal is a model of “regulatory reinforcement,” he said, reminding drivers to follow the state law requiring them to yield to pedestrians in the crosswalk.
The lights are more effective at night, Hausladen said. “At this part of the year, a lot of the day is night,” due to Daylight Savings Time.
Federal Highway Administration studies showed driver compliance on narrow streets shot up after RRFBs were installed, especially when the flashing lights were visible on both sides of the streets, he said.
Each pair of RRFBs costs just under $6,000. The city used its “internal capabilities” to set them up, saving thousands of dollars, Zinn said. “It’s not only about how to bring in the newest national ways of making crossing safer. We’re also figuring out how to do them faster and more inexpensively for New Haven residents,” he said.
Hausladen said city officials considered neighbors’ requests to put the RRFBs on Lyon and St. John Streets, but they would be too close to the traffic signal at Olive and Grand Streets to be useful.
In future projects, the city will look at improving the Olive and Grand Street intersection, as well as crossings at Water Street.
This reporter pressed the signal button headed down Olive Street at around 6:30 p.m. Monday, just as a car approached the intersection of Olive and Court. As the amber lights flashed, the driver slowed to a stop to let pedestrians cross, stalled for a few seconds, and continued toward Chapel Street.