The campaign, Cross Safe WeHo, launched last night with a Facebook page by the same name. The originators are Larry Block, a candidate in the 2015 election for the City Council, Phil Hoskins, Michael King and Marco Colantonio.
“Last year on Feb 12th, 2 people were killed at the crosswalks, there seems to be accidents weekly. Its just not safe,” Block said in a post on the page. “There’s lots we can do. It’s taken a year and a half for the RFB, rapid flashing beacons to be installed. Almost 10% of ALL vehicle accidents in the City of West Hollywood occur on one stretch of Santa Monica between Doheny and La Cienega.
“We need to treat this stretch like a school zone, slow down signs, perhaps street monitors with stop and go signs. We need to be the safest city to take a walk in, not just the most walkable city. Let’s put speed bumps on the ground approaching the intersection. It will help drivers pay attention. Share your ideas, and look both ways.”
A 59-year-old man was struck by a car last Saturday crosswalk on Santa Monica Boulevard near Westmount. Sgt. Chris Tatar of the West Hollywood Sheriff’s Station said that when the man was hit his body was flung up onto the windshield of the car.
A report to the City Council earlier this year said the Sheriff’s Department reported four accidents involving pedestrians and one involving a bicyclist at the Hancock Avenue crossing of Santa Monica and three pedestrian accidents at the Palm crossing. The Council in February authorized the installation of blinking lights at those crossings and the one at San Vicente Boulevard.
John, I seldom see writing done as well as you did here, and your critical thinking and observational skills are also very admirable. Your thoughts should have put a period at the end of this discussion, but I’m not convinced that mid-block crossings are safer than at intersections, as you say. I’d like to see documentation for that. At mid-block crossings drivers don’t expect to have to stop. We may not be taking into account that there are many drivers who are seldom on this stretch of SMB, or drivers who have never (tourists) been there. Until this discussion began,… Read more »
That victim blaming screed above (John) is risible.
Suicidal pedestrians? Very good. Centre for Disease Control disagrees with you, but don’t let that stop you from putting the blame on the victims.
Hope you or your family don’t get run over by a drunk, or distracted driver. It would be horrific if that happened and then some jackass came along, saying it was their own fault, they jumped in front of the car.
That would be a pretty low form of argument.
Sorry for neither hating on cars nor pedestrians.
Wouldn’t be the simplest and most efficient solution for both drivers and pedestrians be a pedestrian light that is either push button and then blinks red (a de facto stop sign as on Fairfax north of Beverly) and/or timed with the other lights (as on SMB in Beverly Hills). Whichever one the traffic experts deem superior?
It would probably save lives and make traffic flow better than the current crosswalk where each person crossing on a whim will stop traffic.
It is a simple and indisputable fact that midblock crossings are safer than crossings at intersections. It is thoroughly documented and accepted by transportation planners. The reasons are obvious. At intersections, there are left turns, right turns, U-turns, through traffic, lane changes, multiple signals, blind spots, and selfentitled pedestrians who think a Do Not Walk sign is a dare. At a midblock crossing, there is only one dynamic: pedestrians who are supposed to look for oncoming traffic before stepping out into the street. Obviously, some pedestrians think they are so far above having to do that, but if they won’t… Read more »
Someone previous said it best: -Shut down the crosswalks. This will allow for better flow of traffic. -This will force pedestrians to use the signal light. -Ticket jaywalkers. More income for the city. – Onus back on pedestrians. If you can’t make the effort to walk the extra bit to the light then you’re lazy and well, too bad. And we all know that more walking is better for you. So win win. @Larry I don’t see a need to form a committee that in the end will have no real NEW ideas. I’m very sorry for your loss. I’d… Read more »
As reprinted from Cross Safe WeHo on Facebook, please like our page, join our page, share our page and let’s move forward with all we can do for safer crosswalks. 7/10 Crosswalk Meeting @ City Hall. City staff present were: Oscar Delgado -Director of Public Works Sharon Perlstein- City Engineer Melissa Antol- Manager Long Range & Mobility Planning Steve Campbell- Director Field Services. Larry Block on behalf of Cross Safe WeHo Armed with your posts and photos provided by David Blaine Etter of his dead ex-partner Mehmet in a body bag it was an emotional introduction. David called me on… Read more »
I have crossed SMB thousands of times without incident. I have never had a close call, or anything close to a close call. Why? Because I look before stepping out into the street. This is something I was taught before I was two years old. I was taught to yield the right of way when appropriate, to be polite and let others go first if they got their first, and to behave in a prudent and respectful manner. Yet now we are being told that we can’t do any of that. We need crossing guard nannies with blinking signs to… Read more »
@ John: well said.
Would everyone please climb down off BlueEyedBoy’s back? He’s the only sane one in here. Seems to me that one of the very first things I ever learned as a child was how to safely cross a street. Now, we need meetings and action groups and a ridiculous number of suggestions as to how to get safely from one side of the street to the other California’s pedestrian laws encourage pedestrian entitlement, plain and simple. Let’s base our street-crossing laws on Darwin’s laws instead, like it was where I grew up. Sheesh, it’s not friggin brain surgery.
A reminder about Comments standards: WEHOville implemented the Comments feature to enable residents of West Hollywood and others who love this community to comment on stories, ask questions of one another and engage in informed debates. With the exception of AOL’s now all-but-defunct Patch, that is something that was missing in West Hollywood until we launched this website in October 2011. As of this writing, there have been 6,381 comments posted on WEHOville since our launch, with the monthly average growing rapidly as our readership grows. Our commenters have raised some smart and provocative questions and offered up some innovative… Read more »
Those crosswalks are a convenience and the vast majority of crossings are achieved safely. The crosswalks should not be removed.
Pedestrians and drivers should be reminded how to drive attentively and cross safely with caution.
I think it would be better for you and for everyone else concerned if you took your archaic, BlueEyedReppublican views to some car centric hellhole you might find more to your taste.
WeHo is moving forward towards a healthy, walkable and livable future where the 1950s transport polices are rewritten to accommodate ALL methods of transit and provide a save environment where people don’t have to be frightened of psychopaths, drunk or texting, while in command of a deadly weapon.
Instead of the expense of keeping law-enforcement round the clock at each of the crosswalks, it would be easier, cheaper and much safer to just remove the crosswalks. It was a bad idea to put them there in the first place.