Beschreibung
A place that cries out desperately for traffic law enforcement is the intersection of Fountain Street with Forest Road and Dayton Street in Westville. Drivers on Forest crossing over to Dayton, AND on Dayton crossing over to Forest, run their respective red lights ALL DAY LONG, every day of the week. The situation is particularly bad (and dangerous) at rush hours, because of the volume of traffic, but the lawlessness occurs all day long. (Drivers on Fountain itself are not nearly so brazen, probably because of the staggered cross-street configuration of the intersection, which would require Fountain drivers to blast through two red lights in a row.)
Any pedestrian trying to cross either Forest or Dayton is totally at risk of disaster.
Honk, yell, or call out these outrageous drivers in any other way, and all you get is utter vituperation in return.
This is another Gabrielle Lee tragedy (at the nearby Whalley/Davis intersection last summer) just waiting to happen. And just as predictable.
Nor are drivers themselves any safer than pedestrians.
The whole situation is appalling.
5 Kommentierens
SLP (Gast)
Having lived on Forest for 18 years, I can enumerate two completely unnecessary traffic flow problems here that probably contribute to red light running. With some attention from traffic and signaling officials, these specific problems could easily be fixed. Fountain, Dayton, and Forest are all state roads, so the state DOT as well as the city would have to be involved.
1. For a driver coming S (from Whalley) on Dayton toward Fountain who needs to turn L on Fountain and then immediately R onto Forest Rd., the lights are not timed properly, which doesn't help. If people obey the lights, they get trapped (awkwardly, given the intersection's layout) between a green/yellow light at Dayton/Fountain and a yellow/red light at Fountain/Forest. The Fountain/Forest light should be timed more generously to accommodate everyone who's just come through the green Dayton/Fountain light.
2. I try never to come W on Fountain (toward Woodbridge) needing to turn L at the light onto Forest Rd.; it's impossible. It shouldn't be, though--that light cries out for a L turn arrow. Many people want to turn L there, can't, get frustrated, and then drive badly as a result.
I'm sure the problem goes further than this, but I am also certain these two measures would help tremendously.
DES (Gast)
Anonymous (Gast)
No, the issue titled "Running red lights" (at the intersection of Fountain Street and Forest Road) has not been fixed. I see no evidence that it has even been addressed at all.
I suppose you might as well close this clicket, rather than keep sending me the same question every two weeks.
CT Livable Streets Campaign (Registrierter Benutzer)
If the intersection were designed correctly, people would be much less prone to running red lights.
The street is currently designed to speed cars through as fast as possible, which is why it is easy for drivers to "sneak through" at a high speed.
Slow the speeds down dramatically using more progressive road designs like those found in NYC's street design manual, and you'll virtually eliminate this dangerous behavior. Not to mention making it a lot safer if people do get in a crash.
Anonymous (Gast)