Editor:
Welcome to scramble crosswalks, Banff’s worst hair-brained scheme since pay parking.
Now, with scramble intersections, the situation has gotten worse. There is far more gridlock, traffic and pedestrian flow impedance, and the omnipresent waiting ... waiting ... waiting.
Several times over the weekend I have personally witnessed traffic backed up from one intersection four-fifths of the way down Banff Avenue toward the next intersection – all at a total standstill going nowhere. Similarly, traffic was backed up from the Buffalo Street intersection across the bridge, passed the YWCA and up into Valleyview.
This is an improvement – how? If council wanted to improve traffic flow with these ridiculous lights, they have achieved the exact opposite. Furthermore, traffic can no longer make a right turn on a red light, which only serves to further stop traffic flow. Even one of the town-hired “observers” at one intersection told me that drivers “hate the new system.” I have already observed several near collisions.
For pedestrians, the situation is no better. I was always brought up on the “green means go and red means stop” system. But now with this system, green still means wait. It takes you three times longer to get anywhere.
On my way to work, I had to stand at the Caribou intersection through four cycles of lights and still the light did not give pedestrians the opportunity to cross. The situation was so intolerable, people en mass just got tired of waiting and went across anyway.
The traffic signals are frustrating and confusing. Green for whom? Who’s green light is it anyway? I have witnessed many people just ignore the lights and go when it is green. I will go way out of my route to avoid these terrible scramble crosswalks and stick to the safer and much faster mid-block crosswalks.
These scramble crosswalks are a total menace, hazard, and impedence to flow. I wish the devil had this insane system.
Banff Town Council – put the lights back the way they were immediately, because scramble intersections have only made matters worse. Your great experiment is an utter failure.
Anyone with a knowledge of traffic flow could have easily foreseen this calamity. The situation has nothing to do with “getting used to it” because it simply doesn’t work.
Mark Bowes,
Banff
