By Jeff Ferzoco, Creative and Technology Director, RPA
I've been obsessed with the design of crosswalks recently. I cross 18 of them a day -- nine each way to-and-from work, and watch how people deal with all the variables coming at them: cars, emergency vehicles, bikes, other pedestrians, and weather. I frequently wonder if there is a more natural and informed way to interact with the street as a pedestrian. Walking into an intersection, there is a ritual of interaction with the infrastructure itself. One walks up, looks left at the cars coming towards the intersection, then at the walk sign, then at the stoplight to watch it turn yellow, then back at the walk sign for permission to cross, at which time half of the pedestrians are already nearly across the street. It's all rather clumsy for such a high-stakes task as not getting killed by a car. It seems to me we are due for a high-tech redesign of the intersection, with a focus on safety, engagement, and interaction. One could even receive information from a crosswalk, emerging on the other side with more than he or she entered with.
On a recent trip, I headed outside into the night with an iPad and two friends, fired up an astronomy program and held it in the air over a section of the star-filled sky. Overlaid onto the real sky were the name and details about every star we could see. As I moved around in an arc, the information followed. We found Venus, Orion, and the Big Dipper. My friends couldn't have been more amazed at what they were seeing. It was a nearly direct, very natural interaction with an alien environment. Something that seemed so far away and hidden was suddenly revealed as intricate and accessible. This type of interactivity with our environment can, should and is happening with our public streets and spaces. It's not just for stars.
A few months ago a Federal Highway Administration project caught my eye. Solar Roadways is a very early prototype of a solar-collecting highway project, designed to test the feasibility of overlaying solar power onto the existing road network. Super-durable glass surfaces embedded with sun-harvesting cells would replace asphalt. These cells could store and distribute power and emit heat to defrost themselves. As if that wasn't enough, each panel has an LED surface that displays the road markings, powers itself, and senses pressure on the glass for wildlife and pedestrian safety and illumination. You can program the road to display anything: road lines, warnings, pictures of kittens. Whatever you'd like.
Just as I was able to hold an iPad to the night sky and receive information, surfaces in our cities could respond to touch and sight and also inform. Ambient information -- expressing data aesthetically through light so it can be comprehended at-a-glance -- could change the way we understand our cities and is very possible with the current LED technology. Above-ground subway stations could intensify in color as a train gets closer to allow more time above ground with friends or for efficiency's sake. All those glowing globes at station entrances? Let's make something of them with real-time data. Imagine our crosswalks glowing green -- illuminating the pedestrian -- when it is okay to cross. Or sidewalks that show a heat map of traffic on the street and sidewalk in a given hour. Or roads that reveal how many cars pass an intersection, turning the city into an actual-scale traffic map. Sidewalks, roads, and crosswalks then have an opportunity to become interactive play experiences, with the pressure from your sneakers releasing digital footprints that linger and inform, perhaps leading to 'paths' that show trends -- well-worn hot spots that guide residents and train tourists through the city. (Then we could finally do away with pranks like this, as funny as they are.)
Of course, this might lead walkers to follow the footprints of jaywalkers en masse directly off the curb, but that's an expression of user preference and should be acknowledged. If it's the better, more efficient route, let it be and maybe start looking at other design solutions, like mid-block crosswalks or fewer vehicle lanes. In her 1992 book "The Hidden life of Dogs," author Elizabeth Marshall Thomas reveals that dogs cross the street in the middle between intersections because it is easier to navigate the oncoming traffic when it is coming one direction at a time, rather than four. Human jaywalkers might just have the right and safer idea. And this propensity of humans to ignore simple traffic signals is what a crosswalk, even an interactive one, must reckon with. If you really want to see this in action, stand at a crosswalk and watch how many people step off the curb and into the street before the light changes. While this is dangerous, it's also an honest look into what in other fields would be called user experience. Intersection engineering has an opportunity to go beyond safety and traffic flow and tap into human nature to ensure folks work with the system instead of against it.
The crosswalk, largely unchanged since cars began moving faster than people, is due for an upgrade. (See this film for what crossing the street used to be like.) We've started to see some nice shifts in transparency, like the recently-installed countdown clocks. But we have millions of folks traversing thousands of intersections each day in New York and beyond. Collecting those journeys and feeding them back as ambient information could make the city experience a richer, safer, and more engaging one. Call it Street 2.0.
@RegionalPlan
Gee, I don't know. I don't think I want that much information. I just want to get across the street safely. And maybe look at the other people around me. When technology provides me with information that is useful, such as telling me when the next bus will arrive, that is great. But information that is provided just because the technology can do it -- meh, I'm tired of it already.
Until a couple of decades ago, San Francisco had a unique degree of respect for the pedestrian. Through the 70's at least, one only had to put one's foot into a crosswalk for all traffic to stop, buses included. Drivers have become much less attentive and polite, as have pedestrians. The influx of drivers raised in other cultures, the increasing congestion and the advent of the "me generation' have all had an impact, none of it favoring the pedestrian. Also, note that the traffic speed was primarily determined by the speed of the cable cars, set at an unvarying 9 mph.
In Barcelona and possibly other cities, the crosswalks are not at the "t" intersection but further down the block. Cars turning make the turn and then stop so that pedestrians are not vulnerable to turning vehicles.
I know too many people who have been killed or injured as pedestrians and it is so dangerous crossing the street in the boroughs of NYC.
This seems like a great solution
Toronto is full of crosswalks but drivers do not pay as much attention to them as they used to. You're supposed to press a button which sends yellow lights a-flashing, point to alert drivers of your presence and direction and then proceed. It was a lovely ritual and one that worked well, but it is no longer closely observed by either drivers or pedestrians, because everyone is in too much of a hurry. North Americans are in such a terrible rush.
As more pedestrians are engaged with wireless devices, they are self-directing their audio and visual experience at the expense of hearing/seeing the signals (including traffic signals) all around them. This can obviously lead to safety issues. As we think about re-designing intersections, we should look at designs meant for the deaf or blind. A pedestrian who looks at a small screen while listening through headphones is effectively both. And that's ok - - just something to consider in design.
Personally, I think there is tremendous potential and appreciate the story and technology update. I have been a safety advocate for years, especially pedestrian/bicycle safety. I was involved with funding the first in-ground flashing cross-walk lights in Washington State back in the 90's and have tried to stay up to speed on changing ped safety technology. The idea of combining ped and bike safety with solar energy collection is great. If you are in a viable solar state, such as the Southern U.S. or Hawaii, it seems that testing new solar technologies is just common sense.
I look forward to hearing more on this and similar subjects.
Sincerely,
Dave Zevenbergen
Hawaii DOT