trgt said:

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AggiePhil said:

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jkje said:

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Saw an ambulance stuck behind a line of cars earlier today.

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Shouldn't happen often. All the ones in town have Opticom systems that turn the traffic light green in the direction they're headed.

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I wish we had driver education matching what you can find in parts of Europe. It's normal there to pull to the outsides of the road in stopped traffic for emergency vehicles to have a path.

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Yes, but when you trapped in traffic with curbs and medians, there is no where to pull over.

And today I saw a disabled adult - walking with a walker and who had a below the knee amputation with a prosthetic- crossing Texas Avenue at an intersection blocked by a median. To get across the street he had to lift his walker and hobble across the median almost falling. He was at an intersection - I suppose TXDOT thinks it is appropriate to force him to walk 2 more blocks to cross at a open crossing just to walk back down another 2 blocks to catch the bus.

Stupidity.


shades of covid and what we did to the elderly in nursing homes - unintended consequences of "safety"

So that I understand, you want that person to cross five lanes of Texas Ave traffic at a location without a traffic signal?

In a perfect world we would not have to have traffic signals to protect pedestrians.

We don't live in a perfect world.


It is hard enough for the disabled to move around with all the impediments we place in front of them - these medians are an unintended impediment.

Roxie146 said:

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And today I saw a disabled adult - walking with a walker and who had a below the knee amputation with a prosthetic- crossing Texas Avenue at an intersection blocked by a median. To get across the street he had to lift his walker and hobble across the median almost falling. He was at an intersection - I suppose TXDOT thinks it is appropriate to force him to walk 2 more blocks to cross at a open crossing just to walk back down another 2 blocks to catch the bus.

Stupidity.


shades of covid and what we did to the elderly in nursing homes - unintended consequences of "safety"

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Which intersection has a concrete median blocking a pedestrian crossing?

The motto of TXDOT: "It ain't broke, but we're going to fix it."

Even in a perfect world, no one should be trying to cross without a signal on a street with a speed limit of 40 mph. That's just dangerous.

That light is much more logical than the one it replaced at Oak

TxDot is closing off the break in the median at Live Oak street just south of Denny's on Texas Avenue. They state that queue'ing traffic (traffic engineers word for "backed
up at the light") from the light at University and Texas covers that median opening routinely. So when someone southbound on Texas stops to wait for an opening to turn left onto Live Oak, it causes problems. First, people hanging a left from University onto Texas immediately encounter a stopped car(s) causing a backup- potentially into the intersection and secondly; Texas avenue northbound travelers trying to be courteous pause to let people southbound turn left on Live Oak. They state this creates a hazard because folks might hang a left on Live Oak that are being let through, only to get t-boned by northbound traffic on Texas that don't see them until they emerge from behind the courteous driver in the left hand lane.

Make sense? Probably more detail than you wanted but there's your answer.

Of course, for me that begs a question: If the median wasn't there at all and it was a turn lane like the good ole days, isn't that safer and smoother than even having a median?

I'm not a fan of medians.

Respectfully

Bob Yancy said:

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TxDot is closing off the break in the median at Live Oak street just south of Denny's on Texas Avenue. They state that queue'ing traffic (traffic engineers word for "backed
up at the light") from the light at University and Texas covers that median opening routinely. So when someone southbound on Texas stops to wait for an opening to turn left onto Live Oak, it causes problems. First, people hanging a left from University onto Texas immediately encounter a stopped car(s) causing a backup- potentially into the intersection and secondly; Texas avenue northbound travelers trying to be courteous pause to let people southbound turn left on Live Oak. They state this creates a hazard because folks might hang a left on Live Oak that are being let through, only to get t-boned by northbound traffic on Texas that don't see them until they emerge from behind the courteous driver in the left hand lane.

Make sense? Probably more detail than you wanted but there's your answer.

Of course, for me that begs a question: If the median wasn't there at all and it was a turn lane like the good ole days, isn't that safer and smoother than even having a median?

I'm not a fan of medians.

Respectfully

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FYI. Cars backup in the intersection! TxDOT has never seen the Harvey/Holleman Cluster **** on Texas Ave?
I do not see TxDOT lifting a finger to solve that problem.

doubledog said:

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FYI. Cars backup in the intersection! TxDOT has never seen the Harvey/Holleman Cluster **** on Texas Ave?
I do not see TxDOT lifting a finger to solve that problem.

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I suspect TxDOT is perfectly fine with cars backing up. Their issue seems to be people turning left anywhere other than at a traffic light.

Bob Yancy said:

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TxDot is closing off the break in the median at Live Oak street just south of Denny's on Texas Avenue. They state that queue'ing traffic (traffic engineers word for "backed up at the light") from the light at University and Texas covers that median opening routinely. So when someone southbound on Texas stops to wait for an opening to turn left onto Live Oak, it causes problems. First, people hanging a left from University onto Texas immediately encounter a stopped car(s) causing a backup- potentially into the intersection and secondly; Texas avenue northbound travelers trying to be courteous pause to let people southbound turn left on Live Oak. They state this creates a hazard because folks might hang a left on Live Oak that are being let through, only to get t-boned by northbound traffic on Texas that don't see them until they emerge from behind the courteous driver in the left hand lane.

Make sense? Probably more detail than you wanted but there's your answer.

Of course, for me that begs a question: If the median wasn't there at all and it was a turn lane like the good ole days, isn't that safer and smoother than even having a median?

I'm not a fan of medians.

Respectfully

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I've had an office there for a decade. That stretch of Texas Ave between University Dr and stoplight at entrance to Barnes & Noble, has a wreck nearly every day. Every day.

The medians haven't done anything positive or negative for the number of wrecks. They haven't changed the seriousness of the wrecks either. No difference whatsoever.

Very few people turn left on Live Oak. If you wanted to swing around and go to Fuego's, maybe. It nearly never happens.

It will add a few more people turning left into B&N parking lot entrance. That stoplight is where 90% of wrecks happen.

I'm not a huge median fan, but the live oak closure makes the most sense out of any improvement operationally. It's going to add like 10+ more car lengths of storage to the inside left turn bay going onto university, that's 10 less cars backed up to damn near Lincoln screwing up through traffic.

There's nothing down live oak you can't get to easier by taking university to Eisenhower and you had a death wish if you ever tried to turn left out of there even dead of night.

The medians have caused Texas Ave. traffic to move to neighborhood street Broadmoor. Broadmoor has always been a busy street but it's so busy now it's so busy it's difficult to cross.