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Safer Roadways: A Complete Streets Guide
Alter Driver Behavior - street design that helps drivers self-enforce lower speeds, resulting in less aggressive driving and increased respect for non-motorized users of the streets. Improve Conditions for Non‐Motorized Street User - promoting walking and cycling, changing expectations of all street users to support equitable use of the street, increasing safety and comfort, improving the aesthetics of the street, and supporting the context of the street. Maximizing the utility of the traveled way calls for use of a toolbox of design elements and facilities for inclusion on Hillsborough County streets. These range from safety elements incorporated to slow speeding vehicles and promote livable streets to dedicated facilities for bikes and transit to increase the efficiency, throughput, and safety for all modes of travel. The greatest benefit of traffic calming is increased safety. Traffic calmed streets typically have fewer collisions and even higher reductions in injuries and fatalities. These dramatic safety benefits are mostly the result of slower speeds for motorists that result in greater driver awareness, wider fields of vision, shorter stopping distances, and less kinetic energy during a collision. Other contributing factors to these superior safety results include a more legible street environment and design advantages for pedestrians and cyclists. Traffic calming can be achieved through cost-effective, tactical retrofits using paint, flex posts, and planters as well as through more permanent reconstruction projects. There are three types of traffic calming measures that could be considered for higher level roads. These include “Narrowing’s,” Horizontal Measures, and Vertical Measures which are intended to reduce speed and enhance the street environment for non-motorists 14 . Narrowing’s refer to physically narrowing the traveled way to accommodate multimodal facilities. Horizontal Measures force traffic to be displaced horizontally such as roundabouts, chicanes, medians, and pinch points. Vertical Measures displace traffic vertically such as raised crosswalks/intersections, speed humps, or tables. The following provides a basic summary of other very common and appropriate traffic calming measures available for Hillsborough County to utilize. There are additional measures to be considered and illustrated at the ITE Traffic Calming Measures online website. Chapter Three, Street Typologies, identifies appropriate traffic calming techniques for each typology it defines. MID-BLOCK NECKDOWNS The presence of long blocks tends to favor high speeds as vehicles have longer travel distances between intersections. The tendency to continue accelerating can be tempered through mid-block neckdowns, often called “pinch-points,” which are mid-block curb extensions. They can add public space to the sidewalk realm by allowing for additional landscaping or seating and can also be used to facilitate mid-block crosswalks. This treatment is often paired with on-street parking, where appropriate.
14 Institute of Transportation Engineers, Traffic Calming Measures https://www.ite.org/technical-resources/traffic-calming/traffic-calming-measures/
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