One segment of Auckland Transports latest business report highlights AT’s latest Pedestrian Safety Shaming campaign.
Between 2009 and 2013 there were over 50 fatal and serious pedestrian related crashes in Auckland City Centre. Most crashes are on Queen Street and Karangahape Road, but also Quay Street, Symonds Street, Mayoral Drive, Victoria Street and most recently on Fanshawe Street.
Two campaigns will be launched in June/July, as part of the ‘Regional Pedestrian Safety behaviour change programme’ to encourage behaviour change in pedestrians.
Cross Safely With the Green Man
Will focus on Queen Street and Karangaphape Road. Final creative approach is shown below, based on the fact that there are ample safe green man pedestrian crossings along these roads.
Media will be situ’ and include Adshels, outdoor posters, wall murals/shop windows and themed ‘urban walkers’.
I love the description that there are ample pedestrian crossings in the city. Having a light and having one that phases frequently enough e.g. like with the double phasing on Queen St are two different things. Many of the crossings are not friendly to pedestrians at all. Also if there are crashes on Queen St then what on earth are the drivers doing as the street has a 30kph speed limit. The second campaign:
Switch Your Focus
The other Auckland streets which have high pedestrian crash statistics don’t have the number of green man intersections Queen Street has. Pedestrians are most often distracted by thought (daydreaming), food, mobile phones and just a lack of focus on the danger. The campaign will inform pedestrians that they need to focus when they cross the road.
Messages will again be distributed primarily through outdoor media, making use of existing infrastructure for message delivery (Adshels) and targeted ‘Urban Walkers’ dressed suitably to the campaign style, who will engage with pedestrians and provide helpful advice.
What are urban walkers dressed suitably in campaign style who’ll engage with pedestrians, its cringe worthy. And before some of you start blaming all the pedestrians remember that if you’re a driver and the car ahead of you suddenly stops, it’s your responsibility to be driving in a way that you too can stop in time.
Seeing the images on Twitter, Andy Baird thinks the images above deserves a meme so has created this fantastic image that might be more appropriate for AT to focus on.
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To me, this is not the way to lower pedestrian casualties – changing drivers’ behaviour around pedestrians is what’s needed. It seems ingrained in kiwi culture that anything goes when you’re not breaking road priority rules and i’ve regularly noticed cars driving dangerously close to jaywalkers on purpose, not slowing down around them when they could easily have, seemingly ‘to teach them a lesson’. This is something you just don’t see in other countries.
that is attempted murder in my books.
In other countries pedestrians will never be at fault if they jaywalk. The car that hits them is always at fault regardless if the pedestrian is paying attention or not. Meaning a drunk pedestrian can cross anywhere since the car that hits them is at fault
A quick note, there is no such thing as jaywalking in New Zealand. You can technically cross any road anywhere you like (except within 20m of a formal crossing or signalised intersection, where you must use the crossing/intersection). In fact if there is no pedestrian signal you are obliged to follow the traffic signals to cross, but good luck with that.
Snd if I’m reading this right you can also technically walk along any road that isn’t a motorway. Having said that there is no rule that vehicle drivers have to give way to pedestrians like they do other vehicles, so you could only do so if you gave way to all vehicles in the process.
So you could technically walk down the middle of Queen St from K Rd to the watefront if you liked, provided you stayed in the right lane, gave way to any vehicles and obeyed the traffic signals.
Even then, drivers are still obliged under the Land Transport Act to try not to hit other parties (even when they legally have the right of way). So a driver who has made no reasonable effort to avoid a collision (within the limitations of driver reactions, physics, etc) could still technically be prosecuted hitting a “jaywalking” pedestrian. Would be an interesting test case…
Unfortunately you’ve missed a step: s11.1(1) of the Road User Rule requires pedestrians to stay on the footpath, s11.4 requires you to cross the roadway at right angles.
As far as I can tell, though, there’s no rule anywhere that requires pedestrians to give way to cars when crossing the road at an uncontrolled intersection. That little tradition is only enforced through fear of being squished by inattentive or homicidal drivers.
Aren’t too safe on the footpath either. A taxi today (GDT210) decided to park in between the lights on the pedestrian crossing on Symonds St, rather than the parking 10m up the road, stopping pedestrians from crossing. A bus driver gives a blast on the horn as the taxi’s tail is very slightly on the road, so the taxi drives up the footpath!
Not uncommon to see cars deciding they can park on or queue-jump by driving up the footpath
Thank you Matt. I like the last 2 images!
What about doing away with the barns dance and having the pedestrian cross cycle with the traffic in the same direction and all turning traffic all give way to the pedestrians. What effect would that have on the pedestrian experience? It seems that there are often far more people moved in the pedestrian cycles than people in the car cycles but less time allotted? Is that just an impression or is it fact?
Usually the time is about equal but traffic varies. The problem jumps out most to me on on the Civic Corner when the lights get “stuck” on “Queen Street Green” for a few minutes (which seems to happen a lot). You’ll have a dozen cars/buses in each side of Wellesley Street and 50+ pedestrians while a car wanders through everything 20s after the initial group.
I thought it was legal in NZ to cross with the lights.
It is legal, unless there’s a red man and it is lit.
This is why AT experimented with those horrible pedestrian crossings where the red man remains lit even if the button hasn’t been pressed. At a standard crossing, where the red man doesn’t light up until the button is pressed, if you don’t press the button you can cross when the cars get a green, and technically you even have the right of way. And we couldn’t have that, pesky pedestrians legally obstructing cars.
(See Road User Rule s3.2(1) and (2))
Most of the risky jaywalking I see is from the bums in the CBD. Often they will just cross against the traffic, probably correctly assuming that the drivers value their lives higher than they do. I have seen some very close calls with them (including one where I was a passenger in the car).
For “regular” people it is usually not too bad, some will cross where the cycle is slow (eg the pedestrian cross on Victoria street opposite Elliot Street) and the street is empty. Sometimes people will cross though stuck traffic and get caught when it suddenly starts moving.
I’d really like to see a countdown lights on the Wellesley/Symonds St corner. Especially at the start of the year I see students crossing on the red not realizing that the bus is coming down Sydmonds and about to turn left into Wellesley street fairly fast,
Surprised they’re not pushing for high-vis vests for all pedestrians. After all, that’s what keeps our cyclists safe. Oh, wait.
Helmets would be a great idea!!
Compulsory walking sticks and a ban on high heels?
6 monthly inspections.
They should roll out those itty-bitty flags of shame around the city!
There needs to be some serious work in crossings, and it’s not on the pedestrians…. AT would probably earn more than the council would with rates hikes simply by putting red light cameras on the Alpers Ave intersection. Every cycle, there is absolute certainty that someone from Manukau Rd will run the corner through the pedestrian green, every single time. And then all those from St Marks up Alpers, again, always a queue running the red, and a heap taking the wrong side of the road.
Other lights are far too slow to phase, especially when there are no vehicles.
Just as bad as the cars going through reds are the cyclists who sprint through at full speed straight at the crossings. You are on the road, obey the road rules……
The biggest hazard presented by those distracted while walking is to other pedestrians; they always seem to be the slowest thing moving and find a way to wave across the footpath to hold up everyone.
However, those last two images…. Hear, hear!
That Alpers Ave intersection has many red light runners indeed. And not only when the lights have just changed, even well in the middle of the red cycle. If a green man tried to make people cross on a green there he’d be endangering lives. It’s so bad I decided to never cross there on a green again – never had any close calls after that. Write to AT about it and they reply it’s a police matter, hah. Too hard basket I reckon, easier but not cheaper to blame pedestrians.
Whole thing needs re-engineering, when you think of the number of students who have to walk across that on the way to the most dense school zone in the country.
Actually, now that you mention those going in the middle of the phase, that reminds me of a time I saw a 4×4, sitting comfortably at its red on Great South, then just going for no reason across the middle to Broadway….. and talking with local parents, apparently many drivers get confused from Broadway as to which lights are for Great South Rd or St Marks.
As for all the nearby schools, unfortunately the council doesn’t seem to care. Mad traffic with red-light runners all around, the flood of trucks cutting corners and swinging wide en route from the port to the airport (at 8am and 3pm at least), and not to mention the rumoured less than pleasant businesses which have moved into that zone (teachers mention up to six brothels have set up recently within 1km, and that the council doesn’t do anything)
The best part is when a driver beeps his horn to the guy in front of him because he refuses to run the red light.
Are countdown lights more expensive to install? They are great for old folks like me.
They are “expensive” (from my admittedly limited experience with costing of traffic signals, I would guess that a set of counters would cost something on the order of 10k-20k) but not particularly costly when compared to a whole traffic signal installation, or most other roading projects.
Minimal compared with pedestrian injury or death costs.
Countdown lights are only slightly more expensive than standard pedestrian lights. I think standard ones are $300 each and the larger countdown timers are maybe $700 each.
In Gentofte, a suburban municipality of Copenhagen, they have timer lights that not only show pedestrians how long they have left to cross during the crossing cycle but how long they have to wait (rarely more than 28 seconds) during the vehicular traffic phases. It’s the sort of empathic design that seems to be lacking at Auckland Transport. The juvenile stunt of putting people in silly costumes and getting them to confront pedestrians might seem a great idea to idiots who run the PR wing of AT and it’s stupid enough to attract the flacks working in the media but it really doesn’t address the heart of the issue that our roads and intersections a shockingly designed, that they discourage active modes and that vehicular speeds are too high for a safe roading environment.
These are pretty common overseas, yeah. They’re great. They should be standard in larger cities in NZ.
In Manila and other cities in Philippines the traffic lights have timers for cars so at least the cars do not have excuses. It will show the last 10 seconds as orange telling drivers that slow down and stop
Maybe a red man to get car drivers to stop at lights, or one in black and white stripes for ped crossings?
Or a man in a red car?
http://media.nzherald.co.nz/webcontent/image/jpg/201430/SCCZEN_A_HBT134113-03_480x270.jpg
So most pedestrian deaths are on streets with a lot of pedestrians. What a surprise.
I walked from Nelson Street to Queen Street once without jaywalking. I think it took me more than 20 minutes. And that was the last time I walked any significant distance in the CBD without jaywalking. At Hobson and Nelson Street alone you can spend a few minutes watching tumble weeds and the occasional car pass by.
there are pedestrian crossing on Queen St such as the one near the Mcdonald’s that take forever its no suprise people jaywalk. I know I do especially when no cars are coming
I find the presumption that the cars will be visible with headlights on rather amusing.
Recently I’ve seen several cars driving ON THE MOTORWAY with no lights on at all. I assume the drivers are under the impression that the purpose of lights is to light your way so I you can see where you’re going you don’t need them.
+1. What does the road code actually say about your lights?
To be visible you need to switch on your lights at way more occasions than just at night.
For example in heavy rain, there’s a lot of people who drive without lights. And in tunnels almost nobody has their lights on. I wonder if the recent change to disallow overtaking in the victoria park tunnel is a consequence of that.
That short section of Princes Street from Shortland Street to the traffic lights that intersect with Kitchener St and Waterloo Qud. etc. is a bit of a nightmare if you try to cross at either extreme. Some cars park so close to the corner that visibility for pedestrians in the middle of the road (where there is a crossing thing) of cars on Eden Cres. is impeded. At the other end, the traffic lights are far too short. You basically have to sprint across Water Quad. to get to the other side before the cars coming up Princes St (i.e. towards the university) have got their green light and are inching forwards to make their turn left into Waterloo Quad.
What a load of rubbish. Blame bikes. Blame pedestrians. But never blame the speeding death traps (aka cars) that are actually the problem. Can’t remember the last time i heard of someone dying from a pedestrian on pedestrian accident. But lets keep blaming the pedestrians and doing our best to discourage people from walking – if nobody is walking there won’t be any vehicle-pedestrian accidents.
That’s called a fight and they happen but they’re not ATs problem.
A fight is different from people walking into each other. Fights happen between vehicle drivers too but i don’t believe the ensuing injuries would be attributed to a traffic accident.
“What a load of rubbish. Blame bikes. Blame pedestrians. But never blame the speeding death traps (aka cars) that are actually the problem.”
You must have missed the thousands of campaigns targeting motorists over the past half century.
You are also incorrect that speeding cars cause pedestrians to walk into traffic without looking. The pedestrian and the pedestrian alone is 100% responsible for their actions, and it’s those actions the campaign targets. Actions of motorists have their own campaigns (and many more than there are targeting pedestrians).
Grade separation is the only answer. Get the cars out of queens street!
Where’s the “like” button around here?
Cars out, and trams in. Then this blog can start blaming the tram drivers every time people walk into their path without looking.
(or could it be we only blame drivers if they are in a mode we don’t like?)
Depends. But we can expect tram drivers to be professionally trained. We can expect them to have a system where incidents and near misses are analysed and learnt from with knowledge shared across the organisation. Unfortunately we can’t expect the same thing for car drivers. Oh and there will be less of them.
Trams are far more predictable in their behaviour – consistent speed, no lane switching, etc. See Amsterdam for streets filled with people and trams.
The safety campaign doesn’t target pedestrians. It targets pedestrians that walk into roadways without situational awareness.
It’s staggering that anyone would criticize pedestrian or cycle safety, but this blog has a long history of doing just that, which is disappointing. You almost come across as promoting the opposite – saying people should be able to walk into roadways without looking or paying attention. I hope that’s not the case.
Good reply Geoff. If someone walks out into a busy road straight into a car it’s hard to see how the person driving the car could either be responsible for that or significantly modify their behaviour to eliminate it.
“Driving should be slower so that when pedestrians get hit they get injured less” = utterly ridiculous.
this is the reason average car speeds in the Philippines are only 20kph. Pedestrians are walking anywhere and everywhere. They will walk on the road as if they are entitled. Cross the road where there are signs saying “BAWAL TUMAWID NAKAKAMATAY” (Not Allowed to Cross You can die) because we are after convenience. Even if the nearest crossing is 10m away if it means walking 10m crossing another 5m then walking back 10m we will just cross where we are. Even climbing the pedestrian overbridge for safer crossing is inconvenient
“speed kills” what an utterly ridiculous message. We should do away with the open road speed limit, getting where you want to go faster is so much more important than reducing injuries in crashes. Can’t wait to drive 150km/h down ponsonby road once they get rid of that 40km/h speed limit. 30km/h on queen street, what a joke!
Swedens zero fatalities initiative, it just wouldn’t work here. The human race evolved differently in Europe, and their lives are worth more anyway.
London is reducing most roads to 20mph speed limit and seeing 23% reduction in casualties, utterly ridiculous to spare so many lives.
https://tfl.gov.uk/cdn/static/cms/documents/20-mph-zones-and-road-safety-in-london.pdf
I think the objection isn’t to a safety campaign as such but to the fact that it is even necessary. Far preferable would be measures to make the streets safer by narrowing them to slow cars; increasing ped prioirity; building safer crossing points; getting rid off slip lanes; adding missing pedestrian crossing legs (eg Fanshawe St); re-engineering massively overbuilt highway-style arterial roads, again like Fanshawe St. Such roads have no place in a downtown urban environment where there is a rapidly increasing workforce and imminent residential growth. They are designed with maximum vehicle throughput as the only goal – with no thought for pedestrian safety, let alone ambience. AT through design and the police through enforcement could do so much more to reduce vehicle speed. We have a strangely lethargic acceptance of death and injury on our roads. Any other transport system that routinely killed ~4000 people every decade would be banned.
And yet our level of acceptance for poor driving is ridiculous. You can be taught by anyone with a licence how to drive, with no specific requirements, and all you need to do is drive to a very basic level of competence for 45 minutes to get a licence. People regularly speed (it’s the norm on suburban streets), drive aggressively, drive distracted etc. Driving is the dangerous activity. The drivers bring their two tonne of steel into the city. We accept maiming and killing with very little repercussions in NZ on the roads. And yet if the roads were a workplace, it would be shut down by work safe.
If they’re not looking when they cross the road they certainly aren’t going to be looking at a poster telling them to look at the road
I’m happy to say that I think people should be able to walk into roadways without looking or paying attention.
Or more to the point, if people do wander onto roadways without paying attention, other road users should already be alert to the possibility and react accordingly.
Here’s how I behave when travelling;
When I’m cycling I pay particular attention to pedestrians to ensure that I do not endanger them regardless of whether or not they are paying attention or behaving erratically.
When I’m riding a motorbike I pay particular attention to pedestrians and cyclists to ensure that I do not endanger them regardless of whether or not they are paying attention, following the road code or behaving erratically.
When I drive a car I pay particular attention to pedestrians, cyclists and motorcyclists to ensure that I do not endanger them regardless of whether or not they are paying attention, following the road code or behaving erratically.
The bigger the mass / power / potential for damage, the more responsibility you carry.
It’s one of those “words to live by” kinda things. For me anyway.
Btw, I agree with you here; “The safety campaign doesn’t target pedestrians. It targets pedestrians that walk into roadways without situational awareness.”
But, that doesn’t mean that Matt shouldn’t use AT’s campaign to point out one of their elephants.
Naturesong, your view is disappointing. You essentially advocate for pedestrian fatalities. If someone steps in front of a car within it’s stopping distance, even if it’s only moving at 30km/h, they are going to get at least seriously injured.
It’s amazing that there are people who genuinely believe it’s ok to walk into traffic without looking. Amazing, and sad. It just so blatently defies commonsense, and proves that more campaigns are unfortunately needed.
Or,
You could read what I wrote, and reply to what I said.
Up to you.
I did, and you were very clear:
“I’m happy to say that I think people should be able to walk into roadways without looking or paying attention”
The reality is ALL persons in a roadway are responsible for safety. Advocating for exceptions is highly irresponsible.
Yup,
I’m happy to say that I think people should be able to walk into roadways without looking or paying attention.
Or more to the point, if people do wander onto roadways without paying attention, other road users should already be alert to the possibility and react accordingly.
And
The bigger the mass / power / potential for damage, the more responsibility you carry.
We recognise this already. It’s why you have to certify to be able to drive heavier classes of vehicle.
Those are the main two lines, but I’m happy to wait while you go back and read the rest.
Btw, neither myself, nor the author (my understanding of the post) advocate exceptions.
I think if you read Naturesong’s subsequent several paragraphs on how he cycles/rides/drives he is trying to advocate for responsibility on behalf of those controlling a vehicle that has the power to kill.
If you hit and kill a pedestrian, even if they have wandered into the path of your car, you hold a lot (although probably not all) of the responsibility. You are obliged to drive to the conditions and in the busy pedestrian environment of Queen St etc, you need to be über alert as a driver of all the pedestrians.
Or, really, we should just get the cars out of Queen St altogether!
Bevan, the safety campaign doesn’t say that motorists do not have their responsibilities as well. There are thousands of campaigns targeting drivers. This is clearly a campaign targeting dangerous pedestrian behaviour.
The view that pedestrians and cyclists are not, or should not, be responsible for safety should be stamped out, and for a blog advocating for better and safer transport options for pedestrians and cyclists to say otherwise is extremely disappointing. It’s counterproductive to what the blog stands for.
Geoff, have you ever visited Vancouver?
Each time I’ve visited I’ve I noticed that as a pedestrian you had to be careful to not stand on the side of the footpath facing the road (or in any other way look like you were going to cross the road) as vehicles would slow down to allow you to cross.
Working towards a long term goal of look for pedestrians would save much more lives.
At the moment if you drive your car into the back of another car it’s automatically assumed to be your fault, we should have this automatic fault for driving into pedestrians.
“At the moment if you drive your car into the back of another car it’s automatically assumed to be your fault”
So hoodie up, head down, music turned up, walk into path of car, get seriously injured, then blame the driver? I’ve heard some stupid things here, but this takes the cake.
Perhaps we should blame the home owner when a burglar cuts himself while smashing the window to get in? And while we’re at it, lets blame train drivers every time someone steps in front of a moving train and gets hurt or killed. It’s all the same thing.
Road safety should be taken seriously by every single user of the road. It’s common sense, it’s the law, and it absolutely staggering that there are people here who actually need this explained to them. Stupidity of the highest order.
More like we blame the homeowner for getting burgled because they didn’t brick in all their windows and hire armed guards.
“walk into path of car, get seriously injured, then blame the driver?”
Geoff, that is already the law in some other countries. I recall reading about it here a few years ago, but not exactly where.
I ride a motorbike as well, and I think that puts us in a different category. A new study in the UK found that motorbike riders were much better drivers than drivers who don’t ride.
In my opinion vehicles should have a maximum speed limit inversely proportional to their mass. cars, 2000kg, max 100km/h. Motorbikes 200kg, max 180 km/h (depending on model), Trucks 50000kg max 50 km/h. It’s all about kinetic energy. How bad a crash is depends on mass x speed.
“It’s all about kinetic energy. How bad a crash is depends on mass x speed”
Kinetic energy is proportional to mass and proportional to the square of the speed. If you want to advocate universal limits to kinetic energy it would result in speed limits for buses being around 15% of those for cars. That being said, I am all for universal (ie applicable to all vehicles) lower speed limits in urban areas.
Correction: 35%
I wouldn’t argue for limits based on vehicle mass.
But, when looking at a roads design, the classes and volumes of vehicles that use the road, the road rules which govern that space, it seems to me that a thorough understanding of this kind of physical behaviour (among a myriad of other skills) is required.
Wouldn’t a more appropriate tagline be “drive to the conditions”…?
We get national safety campaigns telling kids / learner drivers “keep going – it’s us or the possum”, so it’s kinda not surprising that it becomes “I’ve got a right to push through” in the back of people’s minds.
We need some basic education that NZ drivers need telling that THEY, not the pedestrians, need to adjust to driving in an environment where there are lots of people, and where the whole point of that environment is to walk around, cycle around, and basically do urban stuff.
I cannot believe AT is so ignorant in their focus. Watch out possums, you’re not welcome.
“Wouldn’t a more appropriate tagline be “drive to the conditions”
No, because such a line would be silly in a safety campaign targeting dangerous pedestrian behaviour. It would be more suited to a campaign targeting dangerous motorist behaviour, and indeed that very line is indeed used in some of the many campaigns targeting drivers.
Pedestrians should not have to be continually on their guard, continually focussing on traffic, continually deferring to the interloper that has dominated their domain. Because that is what streets like Queen Street are: Pedestrian Central. Motorists are there as barely-tolerated guests and should be made to respect that this is not their territory. It will happen, sooner or later.
Pedestrian behaviour in itself is not dangerous. Pedestrians have danger imposed upon them by cars, driven inappropriately when they are in a predominantly pedestrian environment. Why is all traffic not restricted to 30Km/h when pedestrians are likely to be on or near a road? If road-workers are required to be on or near the carriageway, a temporary 30Km/h limit has to be imposed in recognition of the danger posed by traffic.
This is the problem: TRAFFIC. The problem starts with traffic and ends with traffic. And the problem of traffic-danger will not be solved by a pedestrian-safety campaign. This is merely fiddling at the fringes. Anything, rather than tackle the real villain.
But it will happen, sooner or later.
“And the problem of traffic-danger will not be solved by a pedestrian-safety campaign”
Like others here, you fail to understand what the campaign is about. It is not some general road safety campaign, it is targeting specific people – those folk who walk into traffic without looking. As hard as it is to believe that such people exist, they unfortunately do.
It must be very disheartening for safety campaigners to read messages like yours and this blog.
People who walk in front of cars or ride bikes through red lights are Darwin Award applicants. For whatever reason the rest of us have to help these people who cannot help themselves, and do what we can to ram home the message to them that they are putting their lives at risk through such acts of utter stupidity.
If you put your earphones on, pull your hoodie up, then walk in front of a car without looking, you should expect to have a short life.
OK, let’s continue to re-arrange the deck-chairs on the Titanic or fiddle while Rome burns, and pat ourselves on the back that we are “doing what we can to ram home the message to them that that they are putting their lives at risk through such acts of utter stupidity”. Saves us all having to confront our utter stupidity in unleashing a monster that dominates environments that should belong to pedestrians.
In pedestrian space such as Queen Street, you should be safe putting your earphones on, pulling your hoodie up, then walking in front of a car without looking, as your expectation should be that cars either will not be there, or else will be driven in anticipation that pedestrians have every right to do this, in their space.
Supposing, Geoff, that a tiger appeared in your garden and decided to take up residence there. Would you see your main priority as being to remove or otherwise deal with the tiger, or would you simply leave it there and try to educate your family, children and guests as to how to best to try and avoid getting mauled by it?
Suppose you are working on your house and you are using a skillsaw. Do you:
a) Isolate the saw and store it safely out of reach when your toddlers are around?
Or
b) Leave it lying around plugged in, and treat your responsibility for safety as simply to try and teach your children that they should not touch it (perhaps with a poster or two, showing a green man wagging a finger)?
Supposing oil gets spilled over the motorway? Which is best:
a) Close the road and clear it up as quickly as possible?
Or
b) Leave it there, and try to educate drivers in techniques of skid-control (posters could maybe show the green man as a rally driver)?
Dave, we would of course isolate the tiger. Are you suggesting that we isolate pedestrians or cars? Perhaps put up big fences alongside the roads?
I would prefer that we go with the system that works, and simply have all road users take safety seriously. That’s what this campaign aims to achieve.
Safety campaigns should target all categories of road users, be they motorists, cyclists or pedestrians. We already have extensive campaigns targeting motorists, but the continuing incidents of cyclists and pedestrians being hurt or killed because of their behaviour demonstrates that there needs to be more emphasis placed on them than there has been up until now.
It’s disappointing that so many here want to defend intentional and willfull dangerous behaviour in a safety critical environment.
Put up big fences *across* the roads. One downtown, one at Wellesley St and one up by K Rd would do it…
@ Geoff: “Are you suggesting that we isolate pedestrians or cars?”
Exactly! I am suggesting that cars have no place in what should be a downtown pedestrian environment. All major pedestrian streets should be traffic-free. Or if vehicles are allowed, they should be required to travel at walking speed and always to defer to pedestrians.
These streets should all be pedestrian malls. That is what I am trying to say.
“I am suggesting that cars have no place in what should be a downtown pedestrian environment”
The campaign is for pedestrians everywhere, including busy motorway feeders like Fanshawe Street.
Does anyone have any thoughts on this?
“What about doing away with the barns dance and having the pedestrian cross cycle with the traffic in the same direction and all turning traffic all give way to the pedestrians. What effect would that have on the pedestrian experience?”
Road Deaths? is the current level acceptable? What level is acceptable?
The speed limit in Queen St north of Mayoral Drive is 30kph this includes cross streets (Victoria, Wellesley etc). When was the limit actually enforced? I frequently see drivers speeding down Victoria St to beat the red. The placement of a camera van would no doubt result in easy pickings.
Another hazard spot is the Queen St Mayoral Dr right turn eastwards. The pedestrian crossing is after this turn and it is not uncommon for red light runners to pass through well into the crossing phase. I have on several occasions seen the green man through a buses windows…. just as well I was awake to the situation!
I can’t help thinking there’s a bit of a holier than thou attitude being displayed in the article and most of the comments. Yes, it’s an annoying campaign, but as Geoff says above, it’s not aimed at the majority of sensible pedestrians. It’s aimed at people who walk out without looking, focused on their phone etc, in the hope that it may, maybe, get a few of them to think and potentially save their lives.
It’s all very well saying the real problem is cars, that cars have too much priority over pedestrians, that our streets are poorly designed. All those things are true. AT should focus on these things, and they are. But until all those things are fixed, pedestrians are at risk, and this campaign is aimed at possibly giving a certain subset of them a better chance. The message is still valid even in shared spaces like Elliot St or Fort St, not just on traditional street environments like Queen St.
I am rather dismayed that people here are taking so much glee in attacking this campaign in the belief it somehow criticises pedestrians. Well, guess what, some pedestrians, like some cyclists, and like some drivers are foolish sometimes, and need a bit of a reminder.
Hopefully, AT matches this campaign with one for drivers.
They could spend the money on some 20km/hr speed limit signs instead?
Even if they re-phased one intersection to favour pedestrians with the money it would be better spent than on an advertising campaign telling people the obvious.
Would you be happy if some power lines fell down in your street and Vector just put up some danger signs and left them sitting there for years?
The bad outcome is simply the result of poor street design. How do we know this? All the high incident areas have classical vehicle priority features in a high pedestrian area. None of the shared spaces show up because there those in control of the dangerous devices are alert for the vulnerable.
Fix the problem; don’t waste money haranguing the victim.
Table crossings etc would help.
having walked queen st and surrounds regularly (daily – often im out for an hour tracking around) for the last five years, two observations stand out above others.
one – the worst offenders for running late through red lights are the buses.
two – of all the close calls and the three accidents ive observed where a vehicle has struck a pedestrian – on every occasion it has been the pedestrian at fault
Hi Marcus, looking back at those close calls and the three accidents that you have observed where a vehicle has struck a pedestrian, did the pedestrian suddenly run into the path of the oncoming vehicle, or were they walking so that a competently driven vehicle would be able to stop?
It’s always the pedestrian at fault, there is no other possibility as vehicles always have right of way.
Nope, in NZ it’s the fault of the pedestrian in approximately 50% of incidents.
I find the “cross with the green man” campaign bizarre… pedestrians aren’t generally idiots. What I find more concerning is not pedestrians judging when it is safe to cross the road, but the amount of vehicles running red lights. At the lights at the intersection with Victoria and Albert streets in the CBD, buses and cars frequently go through the red left turn from Victoria onto Albert during the pedestrian phase, putting pedestrians who have “crossed with the green man” in danger. It’s incredible how little focus there is on pedestrians on a street that is a major bus departure location.
I really can’t see how a 50km/hr speed limit is in any way sensible in Auckland city. In fact I would go as far to say that if we had a suing culture you would have a pretty good case to take AT or NZTA to court for allowing cars to drive through a predominantly pedestrian area at such high speed if you were hit as a pedestrian.
I recently had to cross at the intersection of Maioro Street and the South Western Motorway. While it is a busy motorway intersection, it is also the end of the cycle track and the main route for people from New Windsor to walk to the Stoddard road shops and countdown. I thought given that it was a relatively new intersection it would be reasonably pedestrian friendly. I pressed the first of four beg buttons – I was just crossing in the one direction! It took about two minutes to let me cross. Then the next beg button – I gave up after 2 minutes and jay walked the next three (it is quite dangerous as drivers are coming off the motorway doing a lot more than 50km/hr). All up I think it would have taken about 10 minutes to cross one road had I not jay walked!
Why should pedestrians have to accept that? And if pedestrians have to wait 10 minutes on car dominant roads, why can’t cars wait 10 minutes for a green light on pedestrian dominant roads like those in the city?
Terrible, Was it AT or NZTA who signed off that crap design?
There’s a set of traffic lights on Alderman Drive in Henderson and next to PacnSave and between two roundabouts. They have been set there specifically to allow pedestrians to cross and hardly anyone uses them. I suspect the reason why is because they take too long. I tried them once. Pressed the button and two minutes later I crossed the road between the near stationary traffic – the lights had not yet changed. The traffic was near stationary because of normal Auckland congestion.
On a set of lights like this I would expect them to change almost immediately.
This pedestrian victim blaming is so tiring and infuriating. They did the same thing in Christchurch last year with a bus shelter ad campaign instructing pedestrians to look out for cars in zebra crossings (http://www.tfc.govt.nz/assets/Uploads/300×250-web-banner-FINAL.jpg). Ummm…zebra crossings are the ONLY road space where pedestrians always have the right-of-way over vehicles, surely it’s the vehicles that should be looking for pedestrians, no? Not surprisingly, like here, there was never an ad campaign instructing drivers to stop hitting pedestrians, just the same old victim blaming rhetoric directed at pedestrians telling them to stop getting hit by cars. It’s no different from the terrible attitude often directed to rape victims (obviously getting hit by a vehicle is in no way the same as being a victim of sexual assault) – i guess by attempting to cross the street people are “asking for it”.
You’re confused. The campaign doesn’t blame the blameless. It targets the morons who think it’s ok to walk blindfolded into moving traffic.
Bullshit. There’s nothing about blindfolds or morons. It shows one person eating food, another with a phone. This campaign is saying you aren’t allowed to eat or use a phone in the city, instead 100% of the time you have to be vigilant to dodge out of the way of moving vehicles.
They are specifically talking about Queen St and Karangahape Rd according to the press release. My question is why the fuck is there traffic there at all anyway? There are ten times more pedestrians than drivers on either of those streets. Why should the 95% have to stop living and become defensive for their lives against the 5% who have the means to kill them, just because they happen to be on foot?
Where is the campaign that says “don’t eat or use your phone while driving through town”? Where is the campaign that says “There are shitloads of people around here on foot, slow down, drive defensively and don’t drive over them”. Where is the campaign that says “stop fucking driving on Queen St already, its a pedestrian place”?!
Well said. But campaigns are pointless unless the physical environment commicates and reinforces the behaviour outcome required. These two streets just have the wrong form for their locations and purpose. Sort the environment out and we’ll get much better outcomes. Not good for employment of green gimps, however.
Patrick, short of putting up fences, it’s hard to see what could be changed about the physical environment to reinforce the message in the campaign. The streets already have curbs that you have to step down, which to most people makes it blatently obvious you’re steeping into a roadway.
Given that Queen Street in particular is likely to go carless, and gain a large number of trams, what do you suggest be done to the physical environment to keep pedestrians (of the type this campaign targets, i.e., those who don’t pay attention) from injuring or killing themselves on the tram tracks?
” It targets the morons who think it’s ok to walk blindfolded into moving traffic.”
Geoff you have said this a few times now. Do you have a link or quote verifying this is AT’s aim, or is that just what you reckon?
You can’t see that the campaign is targeting people who are not paying attention in a safety critical environment? It’s the whole point of the campaign….
Well that’s it, why is our Main Street a “safety critical environment” at all? It’s a street full of people working, shopping and enjoying themselves.
It’s not like it’s a infectious disease lab or a munitions factory, it’s a bloody shopping centre!
Geoff, you’re obviously right about just stepping onto the roadway without paying any attention. And those “focus” posters, maybe I would give them the benefit of the doubt.
But this green man campaign? On Queen street there’s little reason to cross against the lights. But elsewhere, if anybody tells me to “cross with the green man”, my answer will be “What green man?” The one half a kilometre down the road, or the one that will still take 4 minutes to come around? The phasing of most pedestrian lights ranges from poorly thought out, to just plain bullying. And justifying that with some campaign is just wrong.
Walking fluro condoms escorting embarrassed women across a pedestrian crossing phase seems disconnected from the audience you are suggesting. That is bad comms design.
If they were escorting potential jaywalkers to the nearest set of lights, perhaps.
If they were leaning on AT staff to reduce the wait at said lights for pedestrians, even better.
What a patronising attitude. Sort your traffic lights out so I’m not waiting five minutes for the green man (corner Albert and Wyndham, I’m looking at you, with no traffic) and I might be interested. Or you could get rid of the vehicles out of some areas of the cbd altogether. It should be a people place, not a vehicle place (apart from service vehicles, of course. I still need my food and goods).
On another point, did I see work that looks like a platform at Parnell?
Well maybe the message itself is strictly speaking not wrong—walking onto the roadway without paying any attention is obviously a bad idea. But the idea that only the pedestrians are responsible for staying out of the cars way is very wrong. I first want to see how those 50 fatal and serious pedestrian related crashes happened. For starters how many happened when a car turned into a side street or a driveway?
Think about just how far we go giving cars priority over everybody else. Things like:
• Pedestrians have to give way to cars turning left or right.
• Pedestrians always by default have red light. If you press the beg button during what would be your green phase, you have to wait an entire cycle for the next green phase.
• Pedestrians have red light, even if there’s no conflicting traffic. I’ve seen that when waiting in my car on the Beaumont Street eastbound for the SH1 on ramp. A pedestrian crossing the on ramp also had a red man, despite me not having green light for another minute.
• A controlled pedestrian crossing will only give a green man a few minutes after pressing the beg button. This is totally unnecessary. If traffic flow is a concern then it can impose a minimum delay after the green phase for pedestrians.
• Special mention to the missing pedestrian leg at the Radio NZ building, right between all those apartments.
We don’t need this campaign. Pedestrians have sufficiently strong incentives to cross the street safely (staying alive, in case anyone is wondering). What about making crossing with the green man (or om a zebra crossing, as you can do in Nelson) a reasonable option.
“What about doing away with the barns dance and having the pedestrian cross cycle with the traffic in the same direction and all turning traffic all give way to the pedestrians. What effect would that have on the pedestrian experience?”
Could this be a way to get equal crossing time to the vehicles?
The big advantage with the Barnes Dance is that you can cross diagonally. So it may depend on what your typical pedestrian desire lines are. Always a bit annoying as a pedestrian if you have to wait twice to get to the opposite corner (esp. if each traffic phase is very long). The other thing to factor in is whether you are expecting a lot of turning traffic. If yes, and they’re waiting for gaps in a lot of parallel crossing ped’ns (possibly also blocking through-traffic), that may not be very efficient either (we’ll assume that you have a valid need for all those turning vehs here). So a Barnes Dance may be a better option to separate out the conflicting movements.
It’s horses for courses; work out what you are trying to achieve at each site (esp. in terms of ped vs traffic priority & safety) and weigh that up against the respective volumes.
The catch with that setup is that turning traffic often basically gets blocked. Left turning traffic may have to wait indefinitely for a gap in pedestrians or bicyclists, and right turning traffic may have to wait for the cars on the other direction as well. If there’s a lot of turning traffic then eventually the traffic going straight will get blocked by the queues for the turning traffic.
But in many places there is little turning traffic (eg. traffic along Hobson Street), and it could be accommodated for by a short green phase. And pedestrians walking along Hobson street would have green light for most of the green phase for Hobson Street traffic.
Matt hit the nail on the head:
“Having a light and having one that phases frequently enough e.g. like with the double phasing on Queen St are two different things. Many of the crossings are not friendly to pedestrians at all.”
Some of the “Green Men” seem to take ages, even when there’s no other traffic (or no traffic moving with a green light/arrow). Sometimes it seems as though you have to wait for 2 traffic light cycles to finally get a “Green Man” (I know it’s no excuse, but the longer the wait, the more likely people will cross on a “Red Man”).
Pedestrian shaming is a fair comment. I don’t know how effective it is, but it is a valid concern. I see plenty of pedestrians concentrating on their smart phone and walking out into a live lane and almost getting hit. But any suggestion of victim blaming is utterly ridiculous and misuse of the term. Victim blaming often refers to women who are blamed for being raped, when they were the victim of someone else’s conscious actions.
How can I be held accountable for the actions of someone else? This is the root of the term victim blaming. The word victim implies they are helpless and suffered for no fault of their own which is completely false in many of these pedestrian accidents. If some idiot chooses of their own free will to step out in front of my car, they are not a victim. If I step in front of a moving train am I victim at the hands of the evil train driver? If I choose to smoke cigarettes and get cancer am I the victim of the evil tobacco companies? If I choose to only eat fast food and have a heart attack at 30 am I a victim of evil fast food companies?
This campaign is not victim blaming because many (not all) of these pedestrians were injured because they made a foolish choice. Others were injured because of stupid drivers making bad choices and those drivers would be prosecuted for that. Changing the law so that pedestrians are never at fault may be the right step forward, but I don’t think it will change driver behaviour much.
For record I have noticed that AT is always running campaigns to remind drivers to slow down. Not sure how effective they are though.