January 15, 2008
Mean Streets: Evil Crosswalks of Seattle
Photo by Seattle Daily Photo
Following up on yesterday’s front page P-I article lamenting the perilous relationships between pedestrians and automobiles, Seattlest would like to nominate the 5-way intersection and Monorail crossing at Fifth and Denny as a candidate for next year’s list of dangerous Seattle crossings.
Seattlest has witnessed--and dodged--more than a few accidents at the non-blinking, unlighted crosswalk across Fifth Avenue, which also contains a mid-road Monorail pillar.
Pedestrians must rely on their agility to get them across this intersection before vehicles accelerating south onto Fifth Avenue turn them into roadkill.
City Councilman Nick Licata, whose stepson was nearly killed walking across the street, claims pedestrian safety is his number one issue this year.
Seattlest invites any suggestions or recommendations you might have for underrated intersections of doom that didn’t make the city’s list this year.
Photograph courtesy of Seattle Daily Photo from the Seattlest Flickr Pool
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Westlake & 6th is really scary if you are crossing Westlake on the east side of the street. Drivers taking a right from 6th onto Westlake fly around that corner, regardless of whether the walk sign is lit or if there are pedestrians in the crosswalk. If you are lucky enough to have them stop for you, they aggressively edge their car within a foot of you and then zoom around you as soon as they think you're out of their path, usually nearly clipping you. It's scary. I try not to cross there anymore. I've had too many close calls and I do not feel safe.
Crossing Lenora at 6th on the west side of the street sucks too, for similar reasons.
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The five-way cluster at Green Lake by the Starbucks can be bad. Mostly, it being Green Lake, cars will stop, but some runners treat the crosswalk as an extension of the path and sprint right into traffic without looking before cars can see them.
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I'd like to nominate the intersection of Queen Anne Avenue and Galer at the top of the hill. I have lost track of the number of times I've had to dodge drivers who think that they can just weave around pedestrians.
I'd also like to nominate the editors of Seattle Metropolitan magazine be tossed into some of these intersections. In the latest issue they have a column (that I sincerely hope is satire or at least comedic) arguing that Seattle needs to stop "coddling" pedestrians with their chirruping crosswalks and the bright fabric flags that you see in Wallingford. If they think that's a burden, I'd like to suggest they're better alternatives to, say, crowbars and baseball bats wielded by pedestrians.
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As somebody who used to live on Galer I feel your pain. There is something about oversized intersections that provoke more crowding by cars and people to generally accelerate more than they should.
I would also be willing to bet the writer of the Seattle Metrolpolitan article probably lives in Bellevue or Madison Park and has never had to walk anywhere in their life.
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I don't use crosswalks because I'm pretty sure they're more dangerous than just winging it in the middle of the block.
Sure, cops are all about stopping jaywalkers now, but that's because they really don't have your best interest at heart.
Don't listen to the propaganda; jaywalking is the safer way.
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I agree with Troy; crosswalks and intersections are the worst possible places to cross the street; that's where a driver is presented with the option either to go or to stop, and you don't know which one they're going to choose. Half the time they do both. In the middle of the block, the odds are they are going to keep driving, and you can reasonably base your actions on that assumption. Plus, walk/don't walk signals are fascist. The white man is allowed to walk, while the orange man is oppressed.
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Theres a new mixed use development going somewhere around Mercer near the freeway that is going to purposely make their streets narrow so that cars will have to drive slower, which is awesome. But wow! That only took us, what, 50 years to come up with that?
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Hell, back in my days in the local slam scene (I got better, don't worry) one of my more successful pieces was called the Crosswalk Manifesto, urging pedestrians to jaywalk and generally make their own space since the cars wouldn't do it.
The sad thing is that most everyone who liked it thought I was joking.
These days, I'm thinking we need to make our own space with a baseball bat. And I'm still not kidding.