All entries for December 2006

Traffic islands

A fine road until Coventry council built a centre island:

Centre islands are a major and growing problem for cyclists . It’s become fashionable for councils to construct them to serve as either pedestrian refuges or traffic calming measures.

The idea that central islands make much difference to traffic speeds has been brought into question by a review of traffic calming conducted by the Institute for Transport Studies at Leeds University which indicated that narrowing traffic lanes has little impact on traffic speeds.

As far as the impact on cycling is concerned, an investigation into drivers’ perceptions of cyclists was made by the Transport Research Laboratory under commission from The Department for Transport. To quote the Executive Summary:

Increasing the amount of cycling and improving the safety of cyclists are key aims of the Government’s transport strategy, as set out in the White Paper ‘A New Deal for Transport – Better for Everyone’ (DETR, 1998). Previous research has shown that one of the main deterrents to cycling is a fear of traffic, often attributed to the attitudes and behaviour of drivers [...]

On the basis of this research, a number of recommendations may be made relating to highway design [...]

* physical road features that force cyclists and drivers into close proximity should be avoided, or where this is unavoidable, motor vehicle speeds at such locations should be reduced;

* highway designs that deliberately require cyclists to obstruct traffic in order to produce a traffic calming effect should be avoided as they are likely to cause particular frustration to drivers;

For the whole report (reference TRL549), click here and “buy” the pdf version of the report (it’s free).

: 05 Dec 2006 09:30 |  Tags: Cycling |  Comments (20) |  Close comments |  Report a problem