City
Scramble Crossing at Yonge and Bloor
Toronto will get its second scramble crossing this Friday -- this one at the busy intersection at Yonge and Bloor. This follows in the footsteps of the well received experiment at Yonge and Dundas where the city's first scramble crossing was implemented just over one year ago.
Unlike Dundas West, neither Yonge nor Bloor Streets have streetcars to slow down traffic which means there's likely to be a smoother transition for cars than the Yonge and Dundas crossing. At that intersection, streetcars had been known to hold up traffic behind them for several minutes as they open their doors to let on more passengers.
Still, it may pose some confusion for motorists until they get used to the new dynamics of the intersection. Let's hope they make the audible cues to cross ("Walk sign is on for all crossing") more comprehensible.
Toronto also has plans to implement this type of pedestrian crossing at the Bay and Bloor intersection.
Is being able to cross at Yonge and Bloor in a quicker, more efficient manner something to look forward to? Or will this make things worse for one of Toronto's busiest intersections?
Discussion
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Are there any planned for Spadina?
Jack, you just don't know. Why should pedestrians take a several minutes detour on a level street just so cars can advance a few seconds earlier. And in fact, these Scramble Crossings make it better for cars too, as no pedestrians cross during a green light, and cars can then freely turn right at will.
YES. It took me forever to figure out what was being said, especially over the noise/music levels at Yonge & Dundas. When I hear it, I still tend to think the voice is saying "ONE sign..."
@jack on - The TTC's subway entrances are abysmally difficult to deal with for people with a disability, mobility impairment, chronic pain, or just a big load of shopping bags. Such a 'little detour' for me almost always involves encountering stairs, which means knifelike pain with every step.
Also, when we are trying to prevent virus transmission, it's hardly a good idea to have people touching multiple sets of doors and staircase/escalator railings when they could instead simply walk across the street with no more than an elbow's nudge of a crossing-light button.
--east-west cars go, NO PEDESTRIANS. Cars can turn right unimpeded!
--north-south cars go, NO PEDESTRIANS. Cars can turn right unimpeded!
--Pedestrian scramble, NO CARS. Pedestrians can walk diagonally.
With this setup, pedestrians wait only slightly longer than a usual intersection, and cars can turn right easily. Yonge and Dundas bans right turns and lets peds walk with traffic. This is dumb - you don't get any extra ped benefit from the scramble, and you slow down car traffic. The POINT of the scramble is to allow easy right turns, and Yonge-Dundas is losing out on that.
In the current situation, pedestrians do get some benefit from the scramble: they are able to cross diagonally if they arrive at the corner at the right time.
Currently, the scramble light is only on after either the Yonge or the Dundas light -- I can never remember -- but not both. That both confuses ("is the diagonal going to be on now?") and slows pedestrians down.
Having the scramble after both parts of the cycle would be better, and properly scrambling the intersection (with right turns) should be looked into IMO.
So the Dundas scramble slows cars down. Oh well.
So the Dundas scramble slows cars down. Oh well.
I can't imagine it will be easy for people to get used to, if pedestrians see a green light they'll go...no matter if it says Don't Walk or not.
Personally, I think we should close down Yonge & Dundas to vehicles after rush hour and on weekends (7pm - 5am) and make it exclusively pedestrian. It wouldn't really hurt traffic too much and it would create a pedestrian friendly square that actually encourages people to use the space more freely. Europe has squares like these everywhere and New York recently banned traffic in Times Square.
Cars have their place, but there are a few areas where pedestrians overflow sidewalks and are the majority. Yonge & Dundas and Yonge & Bloor both fall into that category.
Ever see how the scramblers stop like deer on its tracks when an ambulance is screaming at the Yonge-Dundas intersection? More noise pollution from the siren and horn.
Duh-uh. Not just cars! Delivery vehicles, such as the post office trucks, furniture trucks, etc.
If we have some traffic, we're going to have some pollution, but that's no reason to (figuratively) pave over the city just to keep cars from idling. Also, latent demand, anyone?
Yes quite laughable. From the south-west to the north-east corners you would have to first, walk back to the Eaton Centre entrance dodging the "Learn about Islam" people who won't take no for an answer, then through the crowd of loitering teenagers to the escaltor, ride down the escalator, as suburban mall crawlers don't walk on the left, then walk into the subway station, navigating around the tourists who have no clue where they are going, go east and then down another escalator (maybe make a detour into that little known but very well stocked LCBO,) walk through the tunnel, dodging gaggles of tween girls going to Hollister, walk up the stairs, since the escalator here is in month 7 of it's 14 month repair job, then emerge in the subway station, don't try this at rush hour, walk over to the Toronto Life Sq errr.. 1 Dundas East entrance, ride up the escalator, only wide enough for one, then walk outside and finally at the north-east corner.
In Tokyo I opted as often as not to use their underground passages because they are filled with A-grade retail and attached to every subway and train station. Especially Shinjuku Station and Tokyo Station.
Toronto tends to only have narrow stairs, or one escalator with a 50-50 chance of going opposite to your direction. Again, it is easiest just to cross the street.
As for Toronto, I agree we need more density. And you are right that the average Torontonian doesn't know what real, and what good density looks like.
East-West crossing
North-South crossing
Diagonal crossing.
I'd rather see:
East-west crossing
Diagonal crossing
North-south crossing
diagonal crossing
to do something a decade late, does it half-assed and fails
miserably. There are two main purposes of a scramble crossing. Firstly, to allow pedestrians to cross more easily. More importantly (especially for Downtown Toronto), to allow turning traffic to turn without waiting for a gap in crossing pedestrians, thereby allowing non-turning traffic to travel without waiting for turning traffic to turn. In order to do this, the two vehicle intervals in the three-interval intersection have to allow NO pedestrian crossings, as opposed to just prohibiting turns. This defeats half the purpose of the scramble crossing. In other words, it should be JUST NORTH-SOUTH TRAFFIC, then JUST EAST-WEST TRAFFIC, then JUST PEDESTRIAN-ONLY SCRAMBLE. Gotta love this city.
Those "half-assed" commentators who take the time to do any research would know this has nothing to do with moving cars. They would also know that visually-impaired pedestrians find it much more difficult to cross without the sounds from parallel traffic.
Oh well ... as usual the vocal mis-informed never hesitate to express their ignorance!