pghroads

[pghroads]

It All Comes Crashing Down

Well, it finally happened.  No longer is our city’s road system a joke - it’s literally collapsing.

Normally this blog has a lighthearted tone - but I’m honestly furious.  My family and I drive on the Fern Hollow bridge all of the time, I’ve walked on it, ran on it, rode my bike on and under it.  And on January 28th 2022, it collapsed.  Luckily it seems like no one will die from this, but make no mistake - it was pure luck.  A day where schools were on time, or Covid hadn’t kept more workers home and there very likely would have been fatalities on and under the bridge.

The city will claim poor here - Mayor Ed Gainey already pointed out this is why we need to invest in infrastructure (ironically President Biden was in town to tout the new federal infrastructure bill... which would have allocated $0 to this bridge).  But why should citizens of Mississippi or California pay for this?  Why citizens of Altoona?  This bridge collapse personifies how our city has CHOSEN to defer maintenance on this and many other roads.  This road is 100% the city’s responsibility.

Fern Hollow Bridge was opened in 1973, making it not even 50 years old.  There are many bridges older in our city, the Smithfield Street bridge was 90 years old when Fern Hollow Bridge opened.  Making infrastructure last a long time is not a secret - in fact one of the leaders in such preservation technologies is headquartered here - Pittsburgh Paints and Glass.  I’m not an expert here, but here’s a simple example of how you can maintain things:

Imagine a rock chips the paint of your new car down to bare metal.

If immediately you buy a $2 can of touch-up paint, you’ll instantly prevent rust from forming!

If you wait a couple of weeks (especially in our salt invested climate), rust will form.  Now you need to sand out the rust and paint - ok more effort but still doable.

But let’s say you wait longer.  Now the rust spreads, you may even get a hole in your bodywork.  NOW you need to cut out the rust, weld new body panels in, AND repaint it.

But let’s say you still wait.  Now it spreads to the frame.  Eventually the car is too rusted out to be salvageable and you need to buy a new car.

This seems to be our city’s approach to this and many other projects.  Deferring maintenance until it needs to be replaced, rather than keeping up with it.

Deferring maintenance is understandable when the budget is tight.  But since this bridge went into “poor” status in 2011, let’s see what the city has prioritized over repairing it.

Well... they repainted all of the Police cars and Garbage trucks a snazzy new grey color: https://pittsburgh.cbslocal.com/2021/04/13/pittsburgh-police-cars-ambulances-and-city-vehicles-changing-colors-to-represent-steel-heritage/

They built a brand new bridge to service the... 15 residents of Duck Hollow: https://triblive.com/local/pittsburgh-allegheny/pittsburgh-will-require-clean-construction-for-first-time-on-duck-hollow-bridge-project/

They are replacing every street light so we can see the stars better: https://www.cmu.edu/news/stories/archives/2021/september/light-pollution-ordinance.html

They spent a bunch of money on traffic calming, even when the original goal couldn’t be met: https://pghroads.tumblr.com/post/611202612311752704/the-beechwood-bumps

Bike lanes for vanity vs usefulness: https://pghroads.tumblr.com/post/93305185305/some-insight-into-how-bad-road-decisions-are-made (this is continuing with more bike lanes up Beacon - a road no cyclist would use, in order to make a pretty map... while our existing bike lanes are barely maintained at all).

The finance department salaries for the city is five times more the entire infrastructure spending... (Finance dept is 30% of the whole budget!) and yet... they outsource the tax collection to Jordan Tax Services still!!!  At $167m, it dwarfs what seems to be the negligible amount set aside for roads, which are barely mentioned in the budget: https://apps.pittsburghpa.gov/redtail/images/12065_2021_Mayor_s_Operating_Budget.pdf 

Now this is not an argument against any of these projects - I can see the merit in every single one of them.  If we had the budget of say San Francisco (10x Pittsburgh’s).  But Pittsburgh is like that friend who buys a brand new truck, hits the club with bottle service every night, goes on 4 trips to Cancun, and then complains that he can’t afford to fix his leaky roof.

Let’s walk through some tough decisions:

Hmm... deciding between a new paint scheme for our garbage trucks... or my family being crushed alive as we plummet down a collapsing bridge...

Hmm... reduce glare for the stars, or have 10,000 tons of concrete crush me while walking in the park.... geez another tough one.

The city knew for a DECADE this and many other bridges needed maintenance or serious repairs/replacements - this bridge had already been put under a weight restriction, and yet there were plants to fix it until 2030.

Now let me say, every city worker I’ve met honestly seems like they have the best intentions in mind - however it’s clear our leaders have been prioritizing “interesting” over boring things like maintenance.  Don’t be surprised that they’ll suddenly want to catch up on some of this maintenance, and want to raise our already high taxes.  Similar to Alcosan... and the City Schools.  Notice a pattern?  Don’t let them.  Write your city councilperson and have them explain this, there is literally blood on their hands. Demand accountability and change.

UPDATE - the PG has some great reporting here: https://www.post-gazette.com/news/transportation/2022/02/13/Pittsburgh-bridges-state-funds-repairs-Fern-Hollow-Charles-Anderson-Brighton-Heights-West-Carson-Swinburne-Swindell-Larimer-South-Negley/stories/202202130065 as I predicted, there are already claims of “being poor” and Councilperson Erika Strassburger throwing up her hands with bureaucracy or being confused why the bridges were not fixed (props to her for at least giving comment unlike our mayors).  But look at her record and you’ll see why we’ve only allocated a few million dollars to bridges - the safety of these bridges is not even on her radar as she focuses on (worthy, but less urgent) progressive issues like electric charging stations and plastic bag bans.  Get ready to hear how we need new taxes to finally fix these bridges!

[pghroads]

The Beechwood Bumps

So it's been a while!  After I covered most of the main problems that bug me that were created over the last 100 years, the city/state didn't really do anything especially crazy.  Until... The Beechwood Bumps™.

Even though our city has a million fundamental problems with its infrastructure that cause constant gridlock it seems to have turned it's sights in recent years to speeding. I suspect the approach is something like:  

1. Get a 311 call from one or more citizens  

2. Do a traffic study of said area  

3. Implement some solution

This is probably happening all over, but there were two notable projects near where I live in Squirrel Hill.  

First - on Dallas Ave, the city added basically "wiggle poles" in the middle of the street designed to slow down traffic.  

There are of course two things that make these weird 

1. It's on the uphill, where people already go slower   

2. It diverts traffic right into the area where a cyclist would be, huffing and puffing up the hill.  

Finally, they make it quite difficult to turn out of the cross streets with large vehicles, and are easily avoided by people who don't care about lines/laws anyway.  Given the random placement of these I’d bet $100 they got a 311 complaint from someone living on Dallas by Northumberland and Woodwell.

But this post isn't about that - that was just foreshadowing for arguably the most controversial traffic calming project the city has ever implemented, The Beechwood Bumps™.  For this I went beyond my normal lazing ranting, and did some "deep investigation" to understand how this happened.

What am I talking about?  Well, if you haven't been on Beechwood Blvd by the Frick Environmental Center, one day the city added a series of four very large speed humps.  The humps slow traffic from the speed limit of 25 to 15, and have cuts in them for cyclists.  

These humps are unusual for a couple of reasons - first, even though I've driven over 400,000 miles in my life all over the world, I've never seen speed humps in a through road.  They are always on private roads, side roads, cul de sacs etc... This is partly because speed humps on through streets slow emergency vehicles trying to get to where they need to be.  Even more odd, these particular speed humps slow you to BELOW the speed limit.  Third, the cuts in the speed humps allow people to partially avoid them (at the expense of cyclists), and Fourth - before the speed humps I never really considered this a dangerous speeding area, in fact I usually take this road over Shady Ave because it is a slow rolling, relaxing drive with no road rage.

That brings us to the history of Beechwood Blvd.  Beechwood Blvd is a curving scenic road between Schenley Park and Frick Park that was built right at the dawn of the automobile specifically for the purpose of giving these new car owners a place to go for scenic drives - the curves, etc.. are part of the design - it wasn't made for thru traffic as much as just a fun road to drive on.  Of course as the Squirrel Hill area built up, it's now almost entirely lined by residential housing, and the original road has been somewhat chunked up.  Nevertheless Beechwood is still a delightful place for a convertible, motorcycle or bike ride. 

Then the speed humps came - and road rage followed.  People who use Beechwood to commute seem to have a visceral negative reaction to the speed humps, using the bike cuts to avoid it.  Where before I never experienced any road rage - now I get people furiously going around the speed hump and riding my bumper.  Or you get people that practically stop at the speed humps.  Then there is the grey area - police were pulling people over for going into the bike lane to avoid the speed hump, but what rules affect motorcycles, can I use the bike cut or do I need to pop a wheelie over the hump?  The rage isn't just on the road - people took their arguments to NextDoor and Twitter and evidently there is a new public hearing on this due to the outrage (which i cannot find despite my searching, more on this later...).  It's certainly made it a less relaxing road to drive on for a number of reasons.

My main beef is the arbitrary nature of the speed humps - why the single stretch of Beechwood by the low populated Shaw Ave and Darlington Rd?  Especially when the Frick Environmental Center and an Elementary School are right near there, but no speed humps installed by those sites.  So I really wanted to dig into this - was it some councilperson or big donor’s front yard?  Why speed humps?  Why here and not the many other side streets that could use them.

Well - I did a "Right to Know" request (similar to FOIA) around the project after Dan Gilman was responding to wrath of citizens on Twitter.  He mentioned there was a traffic study so I figured sure, let's see this.

From what I could gather in my digging this project happened like this:

1. Between 1-6 citizens complained about speeding by the Frick Environmental Center (the city won't release details on citizen complaints but anecdotally i figured out someone I knew was one of these complaints - so there are indeed real citizens behind this).

2. A traffic study specifically centered on the Frick Environmental Center was commissioned

3. Funding for some of the solutions proposed in the study was secured

4. A public meeting was held around the topic

5. Something roughly 35% of the suggested plan happened 

So what does the traffic study say?  It seems like they put speed monitors on the north and south end of the Frick Environmental Center, and found an average speed of 33.2 and 33 in a 25 mph zone.

33 in a 25.

Otherwise known as basically the speed all traffic goes in most 25 mph zones everywhere (although shoutout the to record setters they found that got to 61 mph).

Okay... so the speeding doesn't seem that bad.  I would guess the average speed in the 25 mph Homestead Grays / High Level bridge is 48mph, so why speed humps here?  

Well - they sent a physical crew out as well, and "observed" that people were hesitant to cross the street at the Environmental Center, and that is basically impossible for people coming from Dallas to get there (oh boy do I know this).  So they suggested putting in crosswalks and fixing the Dallas area so it has sidewalks (currently it has a gap).  It's also worth nothing the only stretch that was slower was to an avg of 29 mph between Darlington and Shaw.  This make sense because the 90 degree turn in the road naturally slows people down.

They also said "look the road is wide, which encourages people to speed", and there were 18 crashes over a 5 year period which resulted in a total of one pedestrian injury, and no major injuries of any crash.

So let's lay out the facts:

1. One to six people complained about the area

2. The study found people go basically the speed they go on all other roads in the city

3. No pedestrian has ever been hurt seriously in the area, and there is average of 3 accidents per year (in a section larger than the study area)

4. A public meeting was announced where only a handful of people attended (I believe the way it was marketed contributed to very low awareness)

5. A plan was implemented which only partially addressed the recommendations

One particular piece of number five was that the original study was around getting access to the environmental center - and the suggested calming was for the north and south sides of the center.  However the north side was never installed, and instead humps were put near Darlington down the street (where the speeds were slower already) - why?  I reached out to a city engineer involved in the project and it turns out a speed hump on the north side of the FEC would affect the Great Race, so since they had the funds they put it at Darlington because they also felt it was hard for people coming off Darlington to get onto Beechwood - but take a look how many people that affects, around 12.

So I'm still not clear why the city decided to put speed humps here - it seems like they took the concerns of a few people over the 6,000 cars who drive this stretch every day.  

What's the problem you might say - people should slow down!  Okay - well why not put speed humps on every single stretch of every road in Pittsburgh?  Clearly that would be ridiculous.  Why this part?  Maybe the city has a list of all of the major speed danger areas in the cities and is rolling out a ton of these, but I live right near this area and it wouldn't even have made my top 10.

I personally believe these speed humps should be removed - through roads should not have speed humps.  These are not major crossing areas for pedestrians - there seemed to be no study of the potential number of pedestrians that would be impacted.  Even with the speed humps, I've still never seen someone crossing here.  

It would be great if the city had a public record of total complaints of various areas to create transparency here.  I have a hard time believing this is the number one problem area - people FLY down Ayelsboro, which is not meant as a through street, thanks to Google Maps.  People FLY down many of our other roads including Wilkins, etc...  The solution can't be to put speed humps everywhere. 

UPDATE - wow right before I posted this the city doubled down on this madness and added more poles leading up to the humps, that require you to slow down and slalom, creating a totally ugly mess of this once beautiful, scenic road.  I think they might have done this because the speed hump crossing isn’t at the actual pedestrian crossing for some reason?  (Measure twice, build a speed thing once?) The city has to be trolling us now, right?

[pghroads]

311 - It's Magic.

When I was invited to talk on WESA with PennDOT and City of Pittsburgh about our roads, I discovered something interesting.  The representative from the city seemed to genuinely want to fix things, but just simply seemed unaware of the issues (as opposed to the PennDOT guy who seemed to think the whole exercise was a waste of time).  It made me wonder, if I start reporting issues to 311, will they get fixed?

When Bill Peduto got elected, one of the first things to happen was they setup a Twitter 311 - @Pgh311 a really low touch way of reporting issues.  So I started reporting.

I reported potholes, and they were fixed within 2 weeks.

I reported overgrown trees covering street signs, and they were fixed the next day.

I reported poorly timed lights and the timing was fixed within a week.

But the thing that really blew me away is I reported a poor traffic condition by my house and they actually fixed that too!

Essentially there is a soft merge and a left hand turn that meet at the same place:

And despite there being a Yield sign on the soft merge (and the common sense knowledge that left hand turns almost always have the right of way), there was constant confusion at this intersection.  Either both cars stopped, or both cars tried to go and there was much honking.

So I tweeted 311 about this issue, and a few weeks later this happened:

First, they added a brand new Yield sign on the right side (there was one previously which was old and not very clear), but they also added a giant mother 9 foot yield sign on the left.  Now this isn't a very elegant solution, but there's no doubt you should yield from this way now.  (I think my neighbors hate me for getting a 9 foot yield sign planted in the beautiful garden).

But in any event, the city seems to actually care and quickly fix stuff, you just have to let them know!

If only this were possible...

BTW - I should mention all the real tweets above I did from my personal Twitters, NOT the Pittsburgh Road twitter.

[pghroads]

More Bike Lane Chaos

Sorry for all the posts about bike lanes, but it's been the direct cause of so many recent road WTFs that I think it can't be avoided.

First, I want to say the barricades around the bike lanes in Scheneley park have been installed, and the new lane looks great.  I still think it's kind of pointless and doesn't go anywhere cyclists really need to go or needed protection, but hey people are not parking there anymore and I've seen a few cyclists using it (although as I've predicted, cyclists, including myself continue to just not use it if you're coming from CMU towards Pitt).

An unintentional consequence of this however is the intersection of Scheneley Dr and Panther Hollow Road now has our civil engineers favorite solution to any minor problem.... an all way stop! 

So now, where there was a peaceful park road, there is a line of traffic every day snaking down Scheneley Ave.  Now don't get me wrong, this has always been a little bit of a weird intersection.  People fly off of Panther Hollow Blvd, but clearly that road should have the right of way.  We can slow people down either through traffic calming solutions, a roundabout, or police enforcement (just kidding lololol!).

In other recent news, the city has expanded the bike lane plans to actually include a really useful artery, Penn Ave from 10-16th St!  As I mentioned in my original post, a lane up through the Strip District would actually be pretty handy.  They are also making Penn Ave one way from 10th-16th street, which I also think is a pretty good idea (having one section of a road be two-way for 6 blocks is the kind of wtf moments that this blog was created for).

The WTF though is that Penn Ave is one way headed west from 16th-32nd st.  So bikes biking down Penn will typically be on the RIGHT side of the street.  However, the city has put the bike lane on the LEFT side of the street, so you need to cross over in this most dangerous of intersections.  Also this all happens at 16th st, which was going to be a future post, but I guess I'll rant about it now, since it could either get better or worse...

The intersection between Liberty and Penn Ave and 16th St has always been a mess, but almost entirely because the timing of the light is dumb.  The primary right of way should be people coming off of the 16th st bridge.

Ie, the light on Liberty Ave should be green the entire time the light for people coming off of the 16th st bridge is green.  The light for those coming off the 16th st bridge should then turn red, and a few moments later (when traffic should have cleared the road between Liberty and Penn), and other light should turn red.

This is not what happens though.  Instead the light at Liberty and 16th is timed to be green when the light for people heading down Penn is green.  So you almost always have people coming off the 16th st bridge getting stuck in this little island.

Will this new one way traffic pattern help things? I believe it will, but until they fix the timing of the light I expect this to still be one of the worst intersections in Pittsburgh.

[pghroads]

Pittsburgh Drivers "Worst" Among Small Cities

Allstate says we're the worst.  To be fair, it says we have the highest percentage of accidents, you have MORE than a 50/50 chance of being in an accident at some point in Pittsburgh.  Most of the press on this has blamed the drivers, but I blame the roads for a large portion.

That said, our drivers are definitely not the smartest (image via reddit)...

[pghroads]

Left lane must turn REALLY left

I've recently had to travel by this area a couple of times, and it's super confusing...

Ok, another typical 5-way Pittsburgh intersection, this isn't my first rodeo.  But the confusing thing is the signage and lanes if you are coming up Mairdale:

Left Lane Must Turn Left.  But considering 2, possibly 3 of the directions possible could be considered left, which lane do you want to be in if you are going down Baytree?  Every time I'm at this light, people interpret it different ways, so you never know who's going to go straight or right or whatever.

I'm unsure who has the right of way at a five way intersection?  I think every intersection must have it's own green light,  since no direction is truly straight.  Would love to know the history of intersections like this.  It's dying for a roundabout.

[pghroads]

Some Insight Into How Bad Road Decisions Are Made

Recently, Pittsburgh was selected to receive a grant for "Protected Bike Lanes".  For those who are not familiar, protected bike lanes are kind of awesome if you've ever been to Manhattan:

It's like a little highway just for bikes.  In New York, these go up the main arteries in the city, and provide a quick, safe(r) way for people to commute around.

So it's obviously great for Pittsburgh to have this option.  But where did we decide to put these protected bike lanes?  Well the first is downtown.  Ok, makes sense, I mean people are commuting downtown right?  

So it connects the existing bike infrastructure where Jail Trail meets Grant St? No.

Oh ok, what about where the Point/Riverfront trail meet downtown?  Well, no not there either.

Actually we decided to just put them on this random stretch of Penn, which is already pretty safe to commute down.

Huh that's odd.  Ohhhh but I see in the articles about this there is some bike convention coming to town, and that road runs right by the convention center.  So it's a way for people going to the convention center to think we're super hip and bike friendly (I'm sure those bikers will never actually call our bluff and use this little "Bike route" right?).  Ok, well that kind of makes sense.

So where's the other stretch going?  Oakland you say?  Thank god!  Oakland is a nightmare for cycling, we can definitely use some protected bike lanes there!

So did we put it down Fifth Ave?  Maybe even connecting Oakland to Downtown?  No?  It's in Schenley Park?

Ok that's cool, you mean like down Blvd of the Allies in Schenley Park, where it's super dangerous to bike, finally safely connecting South Oakland to Squirrel Hill?  Well, no... it's not there either.

Yes, we've decided to add protected bike lanes from Pitt to the playground in Schenley Park.  Maybe I'm not as hip as I was in college, but I haven't seen many Pitt kids commuting to the playground in Schenley Park.  In fact let's take a look at this stretch:

It's perhaps the widest...

Most comfortable...

Stress-free road to bike on in the entire city.  

And while perhaps the one section kind of connects CMU to Pitt, the rest of it doesn't serve any bike connection at all.  In fact, at the end, you get to the stretch of Blvd of the Allies which you'd be crazy to bike on.

So why did we build in these places? Well, it's obvious to me the question was asked "We got this money for bike lanes, where can we put them the quickest with the least resistance?"  If we actually cared about bike infrastructure the question that should be asked is:

"Where are these bike lanes needed the most?"

Well, look you say, how can you complain about free bike lanes?  I mean SOMETHING is better than nothing right?

Well there are two major reasons I think doing something is worse than doing nothing in this case.

First, when you add bike lanes cars expect bikes to use the bike lanes.  During the last administration, bike lanes were added anywhere with wide enough roads.  Most of these lanes are in the "door zone" and have already fallen into disrepair, so sometimes I'll still need to ride in the road for safety sake.  But then cars honk and yell and tell me to "get in my lane!".  So you're furthering the idea that roads are for cars, and bikes need to be on trails, sidewalks or in their own lanes.

But the bigger problem here is that if the lanes go unused, it's going to be VERY difficult for the city to ever pony up their own money for useful lanes.  Surely the next time we look to build protected lanes, they'll look at usage of existing lanes, and where these new lanes exist, I can guarantee they'll get little usage.

This is only all tangentially related to roads, but it's finally started to give me some insight into how we ended up with all these weird intersections, non-sensical lights etc... our politicians make decisions on what's easiest, not what makes the most sense.

[pghroads]

Ok, Seriously. Enough With the Pointless Stop Signs.

For some reason, I keep coming across these lately.  I swear someone at PennDOT is getting a kickback on every stop sign.

Going into Downtown, using the 7th st exit from the Crosstown blvd...

You get our old friend the stop sign.

But why?  The cars on the right are not allowed to turn left (into your path of traffic), and no one else is turning in front of you.  

I'm sure the "reason" is the traffic coming off of 579 from the other direction, but of course they ALSO have a stop sign

You have one/two lanes going into 3 lanes... traffic into this area is usually slow enough that both of these lanes can happily merge together with a yield...

Everyone (me included) stops at this stop, trying to figure out exactly what we are looking for (traffic from the left?).  Until I looked at the map, I had never really realized there is no good reason to stop.  I think even just making traffic on the right stop would be ok, but really they can probably handle a yield sign...

I swear Pittsburgh is the only city that gives no single street a right of way ever, instead gridlocking things by forcing all directions to stop (which I'd argue causes as many accidents...).

[pghroads]

We Love Us Some Stop Signs

Came across this beauty yesterday.  I'd been here before, but it really just sank in how stupid this is.

Heading southbound on I-279 into the city, if you get off at the "East St" exit to go to the North Side, at the top of the exit ramp you'll find our old friend the stop sign.

No problem, we clearly need to stop because that other lane up there has the right of way right?

Well, no.  In fact, they ALSO have a Stop sign.

Well this is a sure recipe for traffic, but hey better safe than sorry right?  If both intersecting roads have stop signs, that must mean the number of lanes is smaller, or they share a lane or something right?

Well... no actually

Three lanes, for three lanes.  Why do EITHER have a stop sign let alone both????  This may be worse than my arch nemesis, the useless Birmingham Bridge yield.

[pghroads]

Explain This One To Me.

So I've already talked about how we love to stick 4 way stops everywhere, instead of just picking a major and minor road.  But one intersection that always confuses me is this one:

I've drawn where the stop signs are.  So normally, roads make traffic stop if there is ample room for cars to pile up behind the stop sign without blocking traffic, while small connections which would result in a blockage in traffic typically do not have a stop sign.

This intersection is the exception for some odd reason.  It seems like there should be stop signs on both sides of Beechwood, but NO stop sign on Dallas.  Why?  Because traffic can backup at the Dallas stop sign to the point that it starts blocking Forbes.  

Meanwhile Beechwood eastbound has no stop sign for some inexplicable reason, so if traffic is backed up to Dallas, these people are using their right of way, and this snake like mess can occur:

Where cars coming from Beechwood to Dallas and wanting to turn left on Forbes cannot because they are blocked by people on Dallas, wanting to turn to Beechwood!

I'd love someone to explain why there is a stop sign at Dallas and not at Beechwood.  Seems like it should either be a three way stop, or no stop at Dallas and two stop signs at Beechwood.

[pghroads]

PghRoads Guide to Driving in Pittsburgh

We as individuals can't do anything to fix the horrible roads in Pittsburgh, but something we can all do is drive the best we can.  

Pittsburgh was recently rated as some of the most courteous drivers in the country.  As an outsider, I can concur, people are super courteous here, but to a fault.  And as much as I hate to say it, we as drivers are just as responsible for the road mess here as PennDOT.  So I've put together a brief guide on how you can improve the roads for everyone, while still being courteous.

When a Lane Ends Use Both Lanes Until The End.

It's sad that PennDOT actually has to put signs reminding people of this, but I've seen it first hand several times, where a yinzer in a big pickup truck will block the closing lane to ensure people don't "cheat" by using that lane until the end.

Have you ever seen a zipper before?

This is the principal behind merging when a lane is closed.  How often has one side of the zipper beaten the other side?  Never right?  So the only way this can happen in a merge scenario is if everyone does not take their turn, or people merge into the open lane early.  Do the efficient thing, stay in whatever lane you were in to it's end, and if you are in the open lane let one person (not three, courteous Pittsburgh drivers) in front of you, and one should go behind you.  Same thing if you are in the closing lane, don't try to sneak two at a time in, let the person in front of you go, then get in behind the person behind him.

The Pittsburgh Left is Taken, Not Given

I've been on the record that anytime you do a Pittsburgh left you are breaking the law, and in general ruining the flow of traffic that our civil engineers designed.  But let's accept the reality that it's the custom here.  The key is if someone is clearly aware of the situation and planning to take it, let them take it (but only one person, not three, courteous Pittsburgh driver).  Do not, under any circumstances sit at the green light and wait for them (who may not understand this odd custom and not want to risk their life).  If they don't go right away, proceed straight and let them make the left on their own, like adults do every day around the world.

Look Before You Pittsburgh Left

The worst person alive is the guy that makes a Pittsburgh left only to realize there are pedestrians crossing after committing.  Now he is stuck, and so is all of oncoming traffic.  When people do this, it's ok to give them the stare of death while they pretend they can't see anything around them.

Don't Slow Down In Tunnels

Another sad state of affairs is how PennDOT has to put signs in the tunnels reminding people to maintain speed.  Scientists have studied the Squirrel Hill Tunnel syndrome, and it continues to be the greatest mystery of our day.  Every day someone, maybe the same person, starts this vicious cycle.  I try to do my part and not brake when people in front of me are.  If you just let off your gas, it's often enough to slow your car, but not enough to freak the people out behind you.  One day we'll identify the criminal that starts this every morning, but in the meantime, do you part and don't use your brakes unless necessary.

If you are the person who slows down, ask yourself why?  Are you afraid of hitting the walls?  Do you drive something larger than an 18-wheeler?  Because they can go through the tunnel without scraping the walls, so maybe there is more room than you think.

Don't Wave People In When the Light Is Green

I see this all the time, someone wants to enter your lane from a side street, parking lot, etc...  By all means you should let this person in.  But not when the light is green.  This causes a huge delay for everyone, and usually only two people will get through in this cycle.  Let the traffic move, and then whoever is stopped in front of them when the light turns red again is responsible for letting them in.  This also applies when people have a stop sign and you do not.

Don't Stop In The Middle of The Road To Wave People In

This is the prime example of "courteous to a fault".  I can't tell you how many times someone has stopped in the middle of the road to wave me in or let me go left.  This extreme courteousness is dangerous because once you get used to the idea that people will let you go, you will be in for a world of trouble anywhere else.  Plus the people behind you are not expecting you to stop, putting you, the left turner and the person behind you in danger.

Please Get Off Facebook

I often bike to work, and you get amazing insight into what people do during their commute since you see them up close.  I've seen people creating Power Point slides, doing their makeup, eating elaborate meals, but the most common thing is using their phone.  Honestly talking on the phone is distracting enough, but so often I see people on Facebook.  Next time you are thinking about using your phone while driving, remember a few things:

1. By far, the most likely way you will die a premature death is in your car.  Not terrorists, not Ebola, not random criminals, not tornados, sharks or the many other things you have worried about in your life.  You have a 1 in 84 chance of dying in a car crash during your life.  That means if you work at an office of 150 people, two of you will die behind the wheel.  This does not include pedestrians, cyclists etc... you could kill.

2. So now we're clear your operating a lethal weapon, would you fire an AK47 randomly into a crowded area while looking at your phone?  Seems ridiculous right?  But that's what I see people doing every day.  Driving a car feels like a passive, almost video game like activity, so we forget we are playing with people's lives.  I like to remind myself every time I start the car that if I'm not paying full attention, someone could die.

3. It's habit to check the phone when it vibrates, so I put mine in the center console.  There is nothing that can't wait for you to arrive safely.

4. Do you want your final act on this earth to be updating your Facebook status? 

If you're bored during your commute, get yourself some new challenges.  Buy a manual transmission car, a motorcycle, or a really good book on CD.

Call/Tweet/Email 311

311 has been very responsive under Peduto, I've seen potholes repaired anywhere from 2 days to 2 weeks.  But if you don't call, it's not on anyones to-do list.  The city doesn't really have the money to fix the roads correctly, but at least we can do our part.

Take Mom/Dad's Keys

Some of the most frightening driving I see out there are the Octogenerians driving their Buicks on our crazy roads, and Pittsburgh has quite a lot of elderly people.  

Don't think of it as taking away the ability for your parent to drive, instead ask yourself "How could I make my loving mother drive to get her own groceries?  She deserves to be taken by someone else".  

I'd bet using an UberX or Lyft for the trips to the grocery store and church would not only cost less then they pay for a car/insurance/etc... but also make sure they'll still be around to see the grandkids. 

What tips would you add to this list?

[pghroads]

Not Making the Grade

Something that I definitely run into in Pittsburgh more often than anywhere else are rain drainage grates that are not at the same grade as the rest of the road.

What do I mean by that? We've all been there, we're in the right lane driving fine when suddenly, dip, BAM!  The pothole that was not a pothole:

People who know the streets end up riding in the left lane, as these are almost unavoidable while driving fully in the right lane.

One of the worst stretches is down Browns Hill Road while heading towards the waterfront, which is simply a gauntlet of drainage grates below grade:

And my perpetual favorite, the "Widow Maker" near the Pizza Hut on Baum Blvd:

Rumor has it, this was was designed on purpose to trick people into stopping at Pizza Hut.

This seems like an easy problem to fix.  There are millions of rain grates all over the world that are at grade with the rest of the street.

[pghroads]

Mixed Signals

Pittsburgh has been doing great stuff in the East Liberty area, to fix the mess made by planners in the 50s.   Where there once was a circle and a road that went under a housing project, we are returning to semi normal two-way streets and the East Liberty core is re-connected to the roads.

But something that bugs me is Broad Street and Penn Circle.  At one time, both of these streets were one way.  But since Target opened, Penn Cir is now two-ways, and Broad St is two-ways except where the parking lot is (inside the old Penn circle).

Google Street View actually had a "transitional" picture of this:

This is about how you'd expect a one way street to look if you were facing the wrong way.  A giant median keeping you from going the wrong way, and funneling in correct traffic, along with no stop light facing your way.

Now however, there IS a light facing the wrong way, and that median has been removed as Broad St is going to be two-ways again.  Here's a really bad picture I took at night of the same scene:

So the road is basically a fully functioning two-way street now, complete with stop light.  The only problem is that the "One-Way" sign still exists.  As far as I can tell, that sign is the only thing that keeps this from being two-way, is there a reason it's not removed yet?

[pghroads]

Updates - Feb 25th

Well, I can only assume because of this blog, at least two of the posts from the past have been addressed by the city/PennDOT.

First, 2nd Ave - Where Laws Don't Exist has been "fixed".  They've made it clearly one weird lane now. Although I think it had room for two lanes, I guess they've decided to make it one clear lane instead.  It seems like this mostly has fixed the chaos, and it only took two years after a fatal crash to resolve this.

Next, along a similar line, the Wilkinsburg DMZ has been clarified. Now here the solution was not to make the lines more clear, but instead to add big signs that say "Form Single Lane".  I've noticed people trying to form a single lane earlier now, but locals still try to make it two lanes.  Pretty sure a gallon of paint is cheaper than that sign, but whatever.

[pghroads]

The Pothole Blitz - Quantity over Quality?

I didn't really want to comment on the potholes.  It's not a Pittsburgh thing really as much as a fact of life in areas who constantly go through freeze/thaw cycles.  Also, this giant pothole in front of my house (which I call "Lothar - Destroyer of Rims") is a constant source of entertainment as clueless people fly into it at full speed.

That said, I think everyone has personally or known someone who has gotten a flat this past week in a pothole.

Bill Peduto is really going out of his way to show the city is listening to us, and setup a 311 Twitter so anyone can tweet where potholes are.  The most common thing I hear these days when the conversation turns to potholes is "did you call 311?".

Here's the thing though.  There are still giant car swallowing holes on major avenues.  5th Ave, Negley, Shady and even the Blvd of the Allies have some pretty dangerous holes.  Yet Beacon Ave where it hits the backroads of Squirrel Hill has it's holes filled.  I see him retweeting potholes being filled on minor roads I've never heard of.

Which makes me wonder, in a metrics driven government, is quantity better than quality?  Why do we have to call 311 at all at this point?  Surely the city could just drive down any random road and spend the day filling potholes.  How are the major arteries not filled first?

Here's some ideas I have for the city in pothole priority:

Seniority - Roads get patched from oldest to newest.  Penn Ave, which was once an old indian trail goes first, followed by the numbered streets, Forbes and Carson.

Number of Lanes - Surely roads with 4 lanes should be patched over roads with 2?  Although maybe the thinking is you can swerve better on 4 lane roads.  (Tell that to the people I saw changing flat tires on Fifth Ave this weekend)

Common Sense - The least likely option of all, but maybe we patch roads in order of use?  Blvd of the Allies, Fifth, Forbes, E Carson, Penn, Liberty first?  I know it's crazy, let's keep patching W. Nowhere Ct first.

[pghroads]

Is it Really Closed?

Greetings from the Polar Vortex Part 2.  Hope all of your roads are running grey with salt and your potholes patched with a shovel full of stones!

It's been a while since I ran into a dangerous road situation that was worth writing about, but not to worry, PennDOT keeps producing fodder for a lifetime.  

Riding down Rich Hill Rd near Cheswick (aka the middle of nowhere), I came across this situation:

It's hard to make out the signs even with my bad photoshop job of two bad photos, but essentially there is a bridge crossing 76, and these signs say "Bridge Closed".

Now, there's nothing worse then driving down a road in the middle of nowhere and coming across a bridge closed sign, somehow you have to find a way around right?  But it turns out the bridge is not actually closed, because I saw a car coming off of it.

It turns out they've just made it one lane, with a temporary stop sign to alternate traffic.  In my world, we usually call this "Lane Closed" or "One lane, alternate turns".  But "Bridge Closed" gives you that familiar PennDOT feeling that maybe once you get halfway, you might just fall into a gaping hole and onto the PA turnpike.

[pghroads]

The Pittsburgh Wiggles

@grabman reminded me of something that always annoys me, the "wiggles" you have to do on Penn and Liberty Ave.  I couldn't find a good Street View of the situation, so here is a crude drawing my 3 year old nephew did with a pen in his mouth (just kidding I drew it, and this is why I didn't get into Art School).

Basically you are driving in the single lane they have, but whenever an intersection comes up, you have to get over in the right lane (which was previously parked cars).  Requiring you to swerve back and forth like a maniac.  Almost always someone from out of town will be confused and go straight in the left lane, resulting in some honking and probably an accident or two.

I don't remember ever facing this situation in other cities.  I'm assuming what the normal thing to do is bump out the left turn lane into the on-coming lane, and not allow parking on that side.