[BoulderCouncilHotline] Re: Pedestrian death

[Cowern, Bill]

Councilperson Friend,
Your Hotline email was forwarded to me for response.  As you noted, an 85 year old male pedestrian was crossing Baseline Road in the east crosswalk when he was run over by an RTD Bus making a southbound to eastbound left turn movement.  This occurred at the Baseline and Mohawk intersection.

As you surmised, when a severe crash such as this occurs then our staff reviews the specifics of the crash (provided by the Police Department) and the specifics of the intersection, including geometry, traffic volume, crossing volume, and crash history.  This is to determine whether the crash was an anomaly and unlikely to occur again or part of a trend in which action should be taken to try and stop that crash type from occurring again.  Should improvements be needed, then we determine what appropriate mitigation should be, what the cost of that mitigation would be and when we would be able to cause that mitigation to occur given our financial resources.

Last year the City of Boulder adopted its Vision Zero Action Plan as part of the Transportation Master Plan.  The Action Plan was informed by the update to the City's Safe Streets Boulder Report which was published last summer.  One of the key findings in that report was that 30% of Severe crashes involved left turning vehicles with almost 20% occurring at Signalized intersections.  Specifically the report states that "Crashes involving left turns and specifically permitted left turns at signalized intersections are the most common types of severe crashes in Boulder."

Boulder is seeking to mitigate this travel safety issue using a variety of tools and targeting both high crash locations and proactive global enhancements.  One of these tools involves changes in the way that traffic signals are phased and timed.  In the fall of 2018, our engineering staff developed updated traffic signal operation practices that change the way traffic signal phasing occurs at signalized intersections.  These include protected left turn phasing, flashing yellow arrow phasing and leading pedestrian interval (LPI) or pedestrian head start phasing.  Our staff has been implementing these changes since that time.  I am attaching to this email a report we provided our Transportation Advisory Board last fall concerning the implementation of travel safety engineering improvements through that time.  Information concerning the intersection of Baseline and Mohawk is included in that report.

In the Technical Appendix of the 2019 Safe Streets Boulder Report there is a section detailing high crash locations, information on any crash trends present at those locations, and proposed mitigation for those intersections.  The intersection of Baseline and Mohawk is discussed on Page 90 of the technical appendix.  A link to that document is provided here:
https://www-static.bouldercolorado.gov/docs/BoulderVZTechnicalAppendix8-1-19-1-201908010955.pdf?_ga=2.217013462.1115932600.1578769882-1277397867.1524696414

The mitigation identified in the City's Safe Streets Boulder report for the intersection of Baseline and Mohawk has been completed.  The short-term improvement to mitigate conflict between left turning vehicles and persons crossing Baseline in the crosswalk was to change the signal timing to include a longer (5 second) Leading Pedestrian Interval (LPI) or Pedestrian Head Start.  Our staff is very disappointed that this mitigation was not successful in avoiding this crash, as our staff had hoped that the LPI treatment would be proven to be a more effective safety mitigation tool.  Clearly it was not effective in this instance.

Other enhancements to this intersection include; protected left turn phasing, flashing yellow arrow displays or a variable warning display (currently being piloted at the Arapahoe and 38th Street intersection).  The City is also piloting a new type of protected left turn phasing that is actuated by pedestrians (it turns on the red arrow only when pedestrians are crossing in the crosswalk).  This new phasing is being piloted at the 30th and Walnut intersection.  However, the poles and mast arms associated with the north and south legs of this intersection are not structurally sound enough to mount the traffic signal displays or variable message sign and consequently a reconstruction of this signal would be needed before any of the aforementioned mitigation could occur.  We will be getting more precise cost estimates for this work but a reasonable estimate for this work would be between $150,000 and $250,000.  Funding for such a reconstruction has not been identified at this time.

I hope that the information provided in my email, the attached documents and the link to the technical appendix of the Safe Streets Boulder report is helpful in answering the questions you have.  Should you have additional questions please feel free to contact me directly.

Sincerely,

Bill Cowern
Principal Traffic Engineer / Interim Director of the Transportation Division
P.E.
[cid:image001.png at 01D5C87F.5F71E840]
Office: 303-441-3266
CowernB at bouldercolorado.gov<mailto:CowernB at bouldercolorado.gov>
Transportation Division of Public Works
1101 Arapahoe Avenue | Boulder, CO 80302
Bouldercolorado.gov<https://www.bouldercolorado.gov/>





From: Friend, Rachel <FriendR at bouldercolorado.gov>
Sent: Friday, January 10, 2020 4:53 PM
To: HOTLINE <HOTLINE at bouldercolorado.gov>
Subject: [BoulderCouncilHotline] Pedestrian death

Dear Co-Council members, staff, and much-appreciated hotline readers:

I was devastated yesterday to read about the death of an 85-year old man who was struck and killed by a vehicle as he was trying to walk across the street at Baseline x Mohawk. My heart and deepest sympathies  go out to all of those impacted by this tragedy.


This intersection happens to be in my neighborhood, and I am well aware that it is problematic and tricky to navigate especially on foot or bike.  As I am still getting up to speed in this new role, I don't know what will happen in light of this tragedy. In keeping with our Vision Zero goals, I assume there will be some sort of root cause analysis and critical evaluation of the intersection - but I'm unsure of exact steps. I would be grateful for an explanation on what will happen going forward to ensure this intersection is made more safe.


Warmly,
Rachel Friend
Boulder City Council Member
friendr at bouldercolorado.gov<mailto:friendr at bouldercolorado.gov>
Mobile: 720-601-0163
Office: 303-441-3002
she/her
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Boulder, CO 80302
http://www.bouldercolorado.gov
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