As transportation chair for the Wallingford Community Council I’ve been closely following the roadway redesigns being done as part of repaving arterials in Wallingford and Green Lake. Most changes break down into familiar cyclist vs parking battles, but one design feature stands out as a terrible idea for both cyclists and residents- the current SDOT plans for adding protected bike lanes around the 5-way intersection of Stone Way N, N 50th, and Green Lake Way N.
The intersection is rated “F” for vehicle throughput by SDOT and regularly backs up with traffic, flooding side streets and school zones with vehicles. Despite planning to spend $12.3 million for paving only 2.8 miles of Green Lake Way N, SDOT says they do not have funds to look at the intersection design. Instead, funds are being spent to force protected bike lanes on either side of the intersection and to add two new signals for cyclists that are near the intersection, one on Green Lake Way N at N 52nd street (tearing out 6-month-old flashing beacons) and another one near N 55th street.
Commuting cyclists will be dramatically slowed down as they must first wait at 50th for the light, then wait to cross the road at 52nd to access a 2-way cycle track, then wait again at 55th. Recreational cyclists are not served as they will continue to use Lower Woodland Park for cycling, just as they do today and as the 2014 Bicycle Master Plan recommends. Vehicle throughput will be further choked off by the protected bike lanes and the new signal lights. Residents and several businesses will lose their street front parking on a 7-block stretch of road where a new 40 unit apartment building without parking is planned for construction (replacing Zaw and Bill the Butcher).
At least a million dollars could be saved if existing bike lanes were kept as-is from N 45th to N 55th, a design that appears to currently be working safely. Alternately, if the goal is really to add protected bike lanes that serve cyclists, then the 2-way cycle track could extend through the intersection at N 50th to connect to the planned regional Greenway on N 46th or N 47th. Vehicle throughput would be preserved, no mixing of cars and cyclists would happen at the intersection, parking would be preserved, and the regional Greenway on N 46th and N 47th would get its arterial crossing. Unfortunately, SDOT considers that change out of scope because it touches the intersection itself. Instead, we are getting the worst of all worlds- an expensive design that makes things worse for everybody.
So far, Green Lake Way Paving Project sessions by SDOT employees have provided no traffic studies, no safety data justifying changes, and show no signs of incorporating any community feedback. SDOT representatives don’t seem to like their own designs, but SDOT is between transportation directors and current plans appear to be locked in by bureaucratic momentum at this point. It looks like SDOT management is just trying to force in as many miles of protected bike lanes as they can so they can hit their numbers for the Levy to Move Seattle. If SDOT has the funds then they should do the protected bike lanes correctly, and if there aren’t funds then they should back off and not make changes until they have the funds to do the job right. Please express your concerns with this issue or other issues to SDOT by using their comment field in the online open house, by calling 206-693-4151, or by contacting them via email at [email protected]. You can also try contacting our elected representatives for this location: [email protected] and [email protected].
They have already made up their minds. These so-called meetings with the residents/stakeholders are post-hoc. They do not care what you or anyone thinks. They expect us to comply as did the mutants in the Time Machine a la HG Wells. They decide and we do…..just follow the path (or should I say bike path?) and at the end of the day, do what Big Brother says, go back into your caves.
They do not care about what happens to the folks in areas that are inundated by people who come into our neighborhoods from around the city to park and leave their cars. It was bad enough trying to find parking near our houses, now we will have an even greater challenge.
If you ask SDOT to help homeowners who will not be able to park near their houses because of the new bike lanes, they look right through you….. A daze .. one after the other…..as if in a stupor. They have given no thought to this.
No thought to how businesses will be affected by these new bike lanes.
In order to satisfy, perhaps a hundred (I am being generous) bikers per day, everyone who lives in the affected areas will have to carry groceries several blocks to get to their houses. How about medical care?
In the few cases where people have driveways, they will have to pay thousands of dollars to restructure their driveways and then they still have the problem of safety. Backing out onto sidewalks, bikers, and cars.
Again, when SDOT is asked whether there is “a ramifications oulet within their bureaucracy” or “branch of SDOT that deals with the negative side effects of their authoritarian mandates”, they look as if they are in a daze, as if they are on a mind altering medication”. Perhaps this medication allows them to tolerate push back or criticism without dealing with the situation?
It is possible that they are not malicious, but merely incompetent. Who knows, they are not transparent enough to
allow a diagnosis.
They claim they are going to redo sidewalks on 40th, that the sidewalks are dangerous because tree roots have damaged the concrete.
However, if they had even the slightest bit of creativity or were open-minded, they would consider narrowing these very wide sidewalks and creating both parking AND a bike lane.
Unfortunately, this would require a higher level of intelligence and we all know the types of people who go into government, those with the worse scores on aptitude tests.
Don’t blame SDOT for the balance between parking and protected bike lanes. City Council reps Rob Johnson and Mike O’Brien represent our area and both have very clearly said before and after being elected that they favor eliminating street parking in favor of protected bike lanes. Elections have consequences. The crazy thing here is that SDOT is planning to build a design that not even cyclists want.
everyone I know tells me they did not vote for them, but this is after the fact.
O’Brien was asked to leave the reception for the new Nordic Museum. Quite an insult. He and his wife were escorted from the gala.
And his wife yelled “Eff the fishermen!”
I loved that story. O’Brien had it coming.
yes, I heard the two of them live in a gated community? Not sure if this is true, but a bit ironic for a person who claims to be a man of the people…open access, transparency, etc………I guess he learned all about rubbing shoulders with common people during his studies at Duke. “Do as I say and not as I do.” At least his wife speaks like a person of the streets.
The way I heard it, they live at an ordinary street address in Fremont.
No, while he owns several properties, O’Brien lives in a sf home in Fremont.
Maybe we should only allow car licenses to those with private parking spaces at home. That would resolve most of the neighborhood parking issue.
Even on E Green Lake Way N, which is relatively heavily used not just by bike commuters, but by recreationists as well, bike represents literally just 2% of the users. I’m guessing the ratio is similar for Stone Way N from 45th up to 50th. And that stretch includes not just residents, businesses that will be impacted from the loss of parking to mollify the bike activists.
When will the nuttiness end?
I think the protected bike lane around Green Lake is a pretty good idea. Northbound East Green Lake is a “door zone,” and this lane should pretty much eliminate that. But I agree that the section between 45th and 55th functions pretty well as-is. It seems that a transition between one-way and two-way bike lanes would work better near the Pitch & Putt, where traffic is calmer than at 50th.
Agree with most of this. Thanks for thoughts on the details!
Thanks for your interest. We just created a FBpage – https://www.facebook.com/groups/240048796620869/ – We hope we can open a wider discussion about how to move forward with both bikes and access to our homes.
Your plan appears to be the removal of the planting strips and trees to allow for a bike lane and on street parking. Is that correct?
Your plan appears to be the removal of the planting strips and trees to allow for a bike lane and on street parking. Is that correct?
Our plan leaves trees on the south side with the parking between trees. The trees on the north side of N40 would need to be removed for the bike lane. Interestingly, most of all the trees on the north and south sides will be removed by the SDot Arborist. They have destroyed the sidewalks and trucks are running into them. They are hoping to redo the sidewalks, trees, and street at the sametime.
I think the 2-way lane on the West side should continue down to 50th, and then continue around the corner on 50th. The current EB bike-lane going under the Aurora overpass is utterly unusable, since you’re sandwiched between moving cars/trucks and a wall. The new design is barely better, moving the lines in slightly. Except that the current lines are gone because people keep driving over them, so what’s the point?
Move the lanes on 50th the North side, and create a continuous, safe connection from Green Lake to the Zoo.
Great info! The wall is scary. Can you attend one of the SDOT sessions and give them this detailed feedback?
I’ve been to most of the sessions, and have given this feedback repeatedly. I haven’t been given a particular reason why it wouldn’t work, or why the EB bike lane on 50th needs to be on the right, other than the potential discomfort of biking downhill the opposite direction as as car traffic in the adjacent lane. However, I’d say it’d be far more comfortable than the alternative.
The only good thing about the position of the current (and proposed future) EB bike lane on 50th, is that it puts you in a good road position to ignore it and bike down the middle of the car-lane.
Great, glad to hear it! May be I ran in to you Saturday 2 weeks ago?
Is EB Eastbound? I had similar thoughts about the proposed lane on 40th.
Hmm, perhaps; not sure… Yeah, EB/WB/NB/SB are the directions.
40th is interesting, because it’s got such a grade that almost everyone can go at reasonable traffic-speed downhill, but almost nobody can maintain a pace going uphill that won’t have drivers plotting their demise, if they were in the lane.
It’s a relatively narrow arterial, and the bus-routes means we need enough room in the general-lanes to allow two buses to pass each other. While 2-way tracks tend to be more space-efficient, it’s possible the only design where everything fits requires eliminating all parking on both sides, and you still have the bus-stop/bike-lane conflicts, and not enough room to put ‘islands’ in, like on Dexter/Roosevelt.
So, we might look back in 10 years, and be like “geez, why couldn’t we have done better there”, but for now it’s better than what was there before, and it unlocks a new uphill route for a lot of people, myself included.
two way tracks are space efficient eh? Is that why I find them terrifyingly narrow? haha
The only part of 40th that I ride, and therefore know well enough to comment on, is from Thackery/Latona to the 7-way stop at 7th/BurkeGilman. The EB side has no parking, and instead has that low concrete wall/high curb and no shoulder. So even though I can go fast, there’s no where to pull over to stop on the steep downhill. And the left from Thackery/Latona on to 40th, as suggested by city and google bike routing, is impossible for me. You have to come to a complete stop to see the traffic, but then I can’t jump across fast enough to stay with traffic flow. I gave up and started using the N side sidewalk.
I wish they could take out part of that concrete wall with grass strip that just requires annual goat mowing anyway. Seems like obvious widening for those blocks. Perhaps its too expensive.
Seattle 2-ways are so narrow, I think they’re going to fade in popularity after the novelty wears off.
Hello Wallingford
We are organizing to keep the parking AND have a bike lane on N40th. We call this the Bikes&Parking Option. We are not an anti-bike group. Many of us believe that the redistribution of the parking strips on North 40th to allow for the addition of a dedicated bike lane gives everyone a win.
Furthermore, the Community continues to be not given an honest chance to weigh-in on this project. Property owners were not contacted and are now being ignored. Furthermore, as of April, SDot added a new area to the project – N40th from Latona to 7th AveNE – and will be removed parking. AND — AGAIN, the new “update” is being done without notifying those owners affected by the change.
After the bait+switch pulled on us about the scope of the project – we are now being told it is too late to make significant changes to the project. The Open House events are design to only explain the poor plan. However, we believe we can make a difference if we mobilize the community.
We have over 100 citizens on a petition and a half-dozen businesses supporting the Bikes&Parking Option.
Please join us to voice our need for a win-win option.
https://www.facebook.com/groups/240048796620869/
….
Phil, how is it that you intend for us to see your plan and, should we agree with it, decide to sign it? Contact info? Dates/times?
Out yesterday evening on a joy-ride, I had the rare occasion to go down that lane. I guess I don’t know what you’re talking about. Yes, there’s a wall, but the lane is normal width and the wall is offset slightly, so … I didn’t have time to check the dimensions, but it seems to me that someone who’s at risk of hitting the wall, would be equally at risk of hitting the curb in the usual situation, with equally disastrous consequences. My heavy recumbent is quite stable at high speed, so I felt comfortable enough to take my eyes off the road (and wall) to see that my computer said I was going 32mph.
That wall may scare people, I can’t argue with that. Everything about riding a bicycle should scare people, but we become more comfortable with experience. That wall isn’t going to reach out and grab you. In my experience, much higher on the list of real road hazards, should be potholes, cracks, manholes etc. in the road. I’ve hit a couple in the last 3 days that felt close to throwing me. Happily none in the immediate vicinity, but there’s a nasty stretch out at the north end of the lake where Greenlake, Winnona etc. intersect – and I understand that’s just outside the “paving project” boundary, though I’d be happy to hear I’m wrong about that.
It’s so odd that cyclists have to wait for a light, cross an intersection diagonally, and then wait for another light just getting across 50th St intersection in route to Stone Way.
Worse, if you are going to be cycling North on Stone Way (bike lane on the East side) and want to take a Left up 50th towards the Zoo, you can’t because you have to leave the protected bike lane early (there’s a curb protecting the lane so one can’t just hop over it) to get into the left turning Traffic Lane. Isn’t the point of bike lanes to prevent that?
Why in the world one would design bike lanes to go from one side of the
road to another is baffling. Worse, that intersection itself! It’s
been voted the worst in the city, and yet with all the millions being
spend on repaving, the city won’t fix it?
As a business owner who looks out onto this intersection every hour of the day I’m so frustrated that the “input” that the SDOT has been purporting to solicit is falling on deaf ears. They said that people want this, but have not studies to prove it, and no business at all that I have spoken with on Stone are supportive of the plan as it is.
The one-side-of-the-road thing is so that there can be a 2-way cycle track on the inside of greenlake, so there is no intersections for cyclists going around the lake. Currently this only exists for clockwise traffic, and not for counterclockwise cyclists. The switch over sucks, and the design needs some work for sure. It seemed to me in the open houses that they are listening to and considering input on more efficient ways to do this.
That’s independent of whether the 2-way continues up the hill towards 50th, right?
I’m not sure I follow. Was only talking about the circumference around the lake, and the N-S portion of Stone/Greenlake way. I don’t know much about bike travel on 50th unfortunately.
Hi, as you mention, SDOT has provided “no safety data justifying changes,” I will help fill in one gap. Unfortunately “if existing bike lanes were kept as-is from N 45th to N 55th, a design that appears to currently be working safely,” is just untrue. In February of this year I was in the bike line on the east side of Stone Way, heading north toward Greenlake (in the daytime, wearing a bright red jacket, following all traffic laws), when a driver coming across on 49th street T-boned me at full speed. According to a witness I was thrown 10-15 feet in the air. My bike was totaled, but I was relatively lucky to walk away from it with only long-term but not fully debilitating injuries. I am now terrified to ride anywhere with intersections and now must drive places, adding to the traffic and parking congestion that we are all concerned about, and reducing my health and happiness.
Yes, that 5-way intersection is a hideous mess, and I too wish this round of changes would deal with it, and yes, the protected bike lane won’t help it, but as I understand the plans, this new design won’t hurt it either. I have spent a lot of time studying it, and while I am not a civil engineer, I am an aeronautical and mechanical engineer, so I am not a complete novice to complex plans. It does seem that it will slow things down for bike commuters, which I agree is frustrating. Often times safety and speed are trade-offs for one another.
I have attended multiple presentations by the WSDOT folks and found that when questioned with respect and interest they are extremely responsive, respectful, and seem to take interest in my thoughts/opinions/ideas. While its true I don’t know yet if my comments will be included, I understand that engineering is an iterative process, and we will need to be patient to see the next stage. During one of these meetings I met another local resident who had an idea for this bike lane to cycle track switch over that seemed quite promising, and the WSDOT folks were taking detailed notes on his comments. I look forward to seeing if any of this is included in the next stage of this iterative design.
Thanks Meredith! I’m so sorry to hear about the accident. I don’t know about the safety numbers overall- last data I saw from about 5 years ago showed the vast majority of reported collisions happening on 50th and 45th, not on Green Lake Way. There are many good designs out there, but they cost more than SDOT is willing to invest. The design they are planning on now is the worst of all worlds- it will make the roadway much less safe for cyclists while also making life miserable for businesses, drivers and residents. I expect that commuting cyclists will be so frustrated that they’ll just bypass the bike infrastructure completely and start using general traffic lanes, for instance to switch over to the cycle track and back. Proof that in addition to “win-win” solutions, there’s such a thing as a “lose-lose” solution.
I wonder how this data is reported. My police report may show up for 49th, even though I was on Stone, not Greenlake way, as the name has not changed yet at 49th. Might need to take that data a bit more generally.
I don’t understand why a protected lane will be less safe for cyclists. Can you please explain why/what this is based on? Yes, high speed cyclists may choose to continue to use the car lanes. Traffic is so slow there now, I’m not sure this will inhibit driving speed much. I think drivers are already miserable, so it doesn’t really matter. If other methods of travel were more safe perhaps people would be willing to get out of their cars and that would make them happier! Cyclists do go to businesses as well. With all the money they save from gas. 🙂
The way I see it, your experience illustrates the problem with protected lanes. They protect from overtaking traffic only – not from crossing traffic, and depending on the actual meaning of “protected” may increase hazards from crossing traffic. The worst there is the parking lane buffer, which it seems they propose to do only on the uphill west side, for a few blocks between 50th and 45th; that design almost guarantees that crossing traffic will be surprised by bicycles emerging from behind parked cars. Since it’s uphill there, conventional bicycle traffic will be slow – but electric motor assisted bicycle traffic could be going rather fast there, and any fast bicycle traffic would be well advised to steer out into the regular vehicle roadway as Eric envisions.
At best – if the “protection” isn’t actually a screen that creates a hazard – it seems to me a PBL is only neutral, offering no extra protection from crossing traffic. How do you think would it have improved your odds?
Also as Eric points out, while 49th is not an arterial street, increased difficulties with 50th have led to a lot of through traffic on parallel residential streets, which increases the traffic and hence level of hazard at intersections with the bicycle lane.
A protected lane around the lake side of the lake wouldn’t have intersections at all (think top of a T intersection), so the cross traffic wouldn’t be part of the equation.
My only other experience with a protected lane is on 2nd downtown, where there are lights at every intersection and some one-way streets. Since its downtown, all travelers expect much more regulated movement.
I think electric bikes might belong in the car lanes on residential streets like this, but that a whole other conversation.
In my specific scenario, the lane would have put me on the opposite side of the street, so near the stop sign that the driver wouldn’t’ve had 4 lanes of distance to speed up before hitting me. But its very specific.
Anything that makes cycling spaces more visible and slows down cars improves safety for cyclists. Mostly I was trying to point out the false notion that this section of streets is safe as is, when it is not. The PLB may not be the best solution. Perhaps disallowing cross traffic would be the only way. Right turns only?
Totally agree about more residential cross traffic due to full arterials, especially when considering the routing of traffic-beating apps like WAZE and some parts of GoogleMaps. I urged the SDOT engineers to consider this in their calculations. This is just a fact that we need to work with.
I think everyone is fine with the proposed track around the lake. But in your scenario … at 49th, you’d still be on the same side, on the right as always … right? SDOT seemed a little vague about design details, but hardly any difference from 45th down the hill to 50th. Differences would mostly be about lane separation, like a painted buffer.
In my first post/response to this article I didn’t propose anything for the 45th-to-lake corridor. Just stated that its not safe as is. I think SDOT was proposing the switch-over at 52nd? But someone else at the open house proposed doing it at 46th. So it depends. Being on the left would’ve put me directly in front of the driver, who may have seen me, but then a driver crossing from E-W would have had the same situation as really happened (in opposite). Really, it doesn’t make sense to plan for just one specific scenario, there are so many.
I don’t think the 2-way cycle track would help where there are so many intersections. Those things are scary, and crossing over is a mess. I like the idea of doing the switch over at the 5-way intersection, since it sucks anyway haha.
For 45th-50th section other mentions in this discussion were better painting of the bike lane through intersections so drivers expect bikes there (the lines are discontinued in intersections, perhaps dashed?), and/or disallowing through traffic from side streets across arterials. Right turn only or such. Even a left turn (preferably in to the middle turn lane). That would have saved me for sure. I don’t think it would impede many people, as those are pretty low-flow streets as far as I can tell (not data based, could be wrong).
The place for the 2-way to start, is the Pitch & Putt intersection, where there’s already an active pedestrian crossing that arguably needs a signal, there’s plenty of room for waiting bicyclists to gather without getting in the way, etc.
Seems reasonable to me!
I’m really sorry to here about your injury. I think part of the problem is that 49th & Stone is another 5-way intersection (Stone, 49th, and Interlake) with oblique angles and poor visibility. I’ve almost been hit by people tearing from Green Lake Way wanting to avoid the intersection at 50th&Stone&Green Lake. Given the proximity to a major, clearly-deficient intersection, I wonder if the best course of action would be to ask SDOT to prohibit east-west traffic at the 49th&Stone intersection, or at least make it right-turn-only.
Yes, exactly! I actually wrote a very similar thing in another response just minutes ago, before seeing your comment Skylar. At the very least, bold paint may make it more obvious in that large space before the restaurant parking lot.
Then they just take 48th. In fact, they already do. So quiet side streets get flooded with even more cut thrus, Thanks, bike activists!
Drivers already can take 48th, but I haven’t noticed them causing the safety problems that they do at 49th. I suspect it’s because it’s a bit less convenient (one more intersection to traverse from Green Lake) and has a bit better visibility.
Given the grid-cutting nature of Stone Way at that point, I certainly agree that it could become a safety issue and it should be addressed in the same way as we’ve proposed with 49th. Stone Way was built diagonally to be convenient to drivers without regard to the safety of others, and now it’s time to correct that flaw.
I don’t see why bikers trying to commute via bike don’t just mainly travel one block in from busy streets. It’s all a grid anyway and a much more pleasant, less congested ride and no need to remove parking. I live on such a street and 99% of the time there’s no car or bike traveling the street.
That’s why, because there are almost no cars. Seriously, people drive through those residential intersections like they think they’re the only thing on the road, and even motorists who slow down or even stop, are somewhat unlikely to spot a bicycle – narrow streets, parking along the curb, etc. So you ride a block, then stop and make sure the coast is clear so you can cross the intersection; then ride a block, etc. Or you blow through the intersections and play the same game of chance the motorists play, with considerably reduced chance of survival. Bicyclists do get hit by crossing traffic on arterials, but at least motorists have some reason to think someone might be coming, and the visual clearance that they might be able to see you. And bicycle lanes may be worth something – the paint SDOT put on 45th along the Dick’s parking lot seems like a good, strong visual cue for motorists.
Anyway, on the stretch we’re looking at here, I don’t know of a good parallel through route, that wouldn’t cost you a lot of time working around arterial crossings.
I think it would work well if we remove parking on those streets to improve visibility.
Vancouver BC has a number of bike routes downtown on residental streets. On these they use planting structures to prevent motorized vehicles from traveling straight at residental intersections. It appears to work well in keeping car speeds down and it does feel very safe to walk or bike on the street.
Potentially good, hard to say much from the description. But it’s kind of my point – residential streets mostly feel very safe, right up until your luck runs out. I suspect SDOT bicycle improvements sometimes come from the same place – perception, over reality. That in recent years their mission has focused on recruitment, to the extent that they are willing to do things that may provide more of an illusion of safety.
Hm, yea, may be paint would have helped me. The angle of that intersection is very wide, and the bike lane is not obvious from a distance there.
Residential streets definitely have the risks you (Donn) mention in addition to darkness and parked cars to obscure you.
How will the experence for pedestrians at this intersection change?
The intersection at 50th will not change. At 52nd pedestrians will lose the flashing beacon put in 6 months ago and will instead need to wait for a signal light that is hopefully coordinated with the light at 50th.
oh but it’ll be sooo worth it to mess up yet another road for the tiny % of bike riding citizens that will utilize this.
I don’t think it’ll change much for the cars. That intersection will continue to suck as is.
I believe the reconfiguration of 50th to include a middle turn lane made that arterial much more congested and less safe for pedestrians. It is time to consider making a few selected arterials for “bikes only,” making their commute safer and the car/bus commute faster.
hm, interesting idea. what is a parallel low-grade arterial for the stone-greenlake way corridor?
This is kind of tangential to the subject, if you’re talking about 50th east of Stone, which isn’t part of the project, but … more specifics on these three points?
1. Sure a middle turn lane made it more congested? I don’t drive an awful lot, but the 4 lanes I encounter regularly have a lot of trouble flowing smoothly with left turns blocking the left lane, and the pedestrian crossings are wretched when someone stops and frantically tries to get you to walk out into the road, while other traffic gets ready to pick you off when you come out from behind that car. I don’t have anything at hand on the numbers, but I understand in some cases – e.g., Stone I believe – the throughput actually improves.
2. Do we think bicycles are slowing down traffic, on 50th, or is the idea that without any bicycles allowed we could go back to 4 lanes?
3. Where would your bicycle arterial go, and how would it support full speed bicycle traffic?
Ironically, I just heard from a local pillar of the community who is out of commission while his bones knit, after a bicycle collision – on the Burke Gilman, vs. another bicyclist. There’s no safety anywhere! Though I suppose anyone who’s spent much time on that trail might not be a bit surprised. My favorite is night bicycling, without lights, on stretches that have no lighting at all. The spine tingling “whoosh” of a bicycle passing in the other direction, unseen – nothing like it! Or if it isn’t dark enough for that, you can turn your over-powered headlight on, and tilt it up enough that approaching cyclists can’t see anything, and watch them veer off in random directions – that seems to be a very popular form of amusement.
@GOEU – don’t give up! Crown Hill was able to get a redesign of a bicycle crossing that would have removed a well used pedestrian bridge. The neighborhood met with the city, voiced concerns and the pedestrian bridge was saved with a redesigned crossing that saved tons of taxpayer money on the project.
You can get your voice heard and change the design but you must keep communicating the problem to the neighbors and get them to come speak at a meeting with the designers!