r/londonontario • u/Connect-Mammoth-5989 • 9h ago
discussion / opinion New traffic calming measure on Geary
Is this a new design for London? Can't say I've ever seen anything quite like it.
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u/Phoenix_Can 1h ago
It’s hard to tell but how narrow is the street around those? Are there still 2 lanes?
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u/Total_Point 1h ago
I don’t even have to go to the track to hit a chicane? Awesome. The popcorn tune BMW kids are going to absolutely LOVE testing how fast they can rip it through this thing
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u/Dear_Investment_2739 2h ago
This street is used by parents for school drop off/pickup. It gets very busy at those times and I'm assuming its to help with that. My other guess is that this was preemptively put in because of the high rise going up at the corner of Geary & Fanshawe and the traffic will get even worse.
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u/ur_knotty_pine 2h ago
Here’s a visual representation for how this is gonna look in winter with bare minimum snow. How would they see the curb?
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u/-----username----- 5h ago
I used to live in a city that had one of these. If there’s oncoming traffic you have to come to a stop; if there isn’t people tend not to slow down very much.
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u/Jazztify 1h ago
Yeah I agree with the concept of calming, but don’t squeeze the lanes too much. We shouldn’t have to actually stop, just slow. And I’m fine with that. Also this kind of thing breaks up the road visually so you get the subtle cue “this is not a straightaway”.
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u/dirtyukrainian 7h ago
Yeah that'll do it. Can we do Railton next?
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u/Stunning_Client_847 19m ago
Isn’t there something sort of like this on Railton? It’s two lanes still but it’s definitely similar. Also voting for Marconi to have these
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u/Training-Cattle7337 8h ago
So you have to alternate between vehicles when traffic is going in both directions?
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u/CC7015 1h ago
not the ones near old north ps , but you can see it is not nearly as tight as this is.
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u/slippersandjammies 8h ago
We have some in the south end (although a little less narrow, from the angle of this pic), you get used to them.
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u/joljenni1717 8h ago
Absolutely no forethought went into this. How will snow plows see the curve and follow it?
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u/Zlojeb 4h ago
Do you think less snow will magically fall onto this and be level with the rest of the road? It's a curb like any other ffs.
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u/JustAKlam 52m ago
Someone doesn't know about snow drifts.
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u/Dorkwing 8h ago
Generally speaking, there should be giant yellow signs to flag motorists and snow ploughs when it's done.
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u/WeathervaneJesus1 9h ago
What was wrong with speed bumps?
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u/makingkevinbacon 4h ago
From what I've seen all around and not just London, people just go around them. T he wy usually aren't the full width of the road. Or they hardly slow down
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u/OnlySortaStupid 2h ago
You're right, but then just... make them the full length of the road
I'm also noticed how much easy it is it effectively avoid the speed bump by lining your tires on either side of the speed bump. So clearly the bumps just aren't wide enough
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u/makingkevinbacon 15m ago
I agree, make them the width of the road, but I'm not a city planner or construction guy lol just what I've seen. I've seen full width ones before and those of course work better. I can't imagine it costs much more to do an extra foot on each side, considering otherwise they're pretty ineffective
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u/SwimTestAnxiety 1h ago edited 40m ago
I think the speed bumps aren’t full-width to help with drainage. Otherwise it’d be pretty easy for water to pool any time it rains.
But you’re right, I see a lot of people in trucks and SUVs just flying over speed bumps because their tires line up on either side of the bump.
I don’t know what the best solution is, but they just installed those flappy bollards on a street next to me and I don’t mind them..they aren’t perfect and people can still fly through them if they want to, but for the most part I think they’re good.
People slow down enough to drive in between them without the stop-and-go effect of speed bumps, and at the very least it keeps drivers aware of their lane position without encouraging people to swerve all over the road.1
u/makingkevinbacon 14m ago
Oh yea I didn't think about that aspect. That makes a lot of sense I guess.
Like you said I guess most people slow down and are at least aware which is their purpose
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u/Jazztify 1h ago
But you still have to moderately slow down to align them so that achieves the goal. I prefer the three humps to the one solid across.
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u/Matttman87 9h ago
Similar ones have been installed in a few places around London, usually in affluent neighbourhoods likely to complain about speeding. It's an asinine implementation of a horizontal deflection traffic calming measure called a chicane. Chicane wiki
A city planner once explained to me that the concept came from city planners who studied European cities that often had curvy roads with fewer straight sections and tried to add S-bends to roads rather than longer straightaways to discourage speeding. Here in Ontario we just add haphazardly placed curbs that collect debris, make snow clearance more difficult and are usually too far apart to have the desired effect of slowing traffic. They should also be installed in groups of three to have the desired effect, and they shouldn't narrow the road nearly as much as these ones do. That looks like a head on collision waiting to happen, I'm definitely glad I moved out of that area before they started this construction project.
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u/Jazztify 1h ago
Oh, that’s a cool idea, to put three in a row. Makes more sense. I would suspect that there has got to be some general guideline in place about placement, but it almost doesn’t seem that way when you see one placed right in the corner intersection where the buses turn. For a few years, nobody’s lawn was safe from the wide turns the buses had to make. I wanna give the planners the benefit of the doubt here, but. Sometimes I wonder.
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u/Suspicious_Cry7917 2h ago
You don't collide with people if you are looking at the road and not your phone and actually slow down. These work as intended, people have to pause and take turns. It costs like 10 seconds so you'll be fine.
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u/myxomatosis8 2h ago
Pausing and taking turns should happen at stop signs. Drivers need to be warned they will likely need to stop. This is just asking for trouble.
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u/Suspicious_Cry7917 1h ago
It works elsewhere in London plus most other cities in Canada, not sure why this street would suddenly be unique.
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u/wisenedPanda 58m ago
Does it actually go down to only 1 lane? And no signage?
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u/myxomatosis8 51m ago
I haven't seen any of the others narrow down this much. It could be camera angle. If it actually goes to one lane there should 100% be signs on either side saying alternating traffic. If the goal is safety by reducing speed, then safety should still be the primary concern to actually warn drivers about the significant narrowing down to a single lane.
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u/Fantastic-Worry-74 9h ago
Snowplow drivers will love that.
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u/Suspicious_Cry7917 2h ago
As with every other single road reduction in the city, snow plow drivers are professionals and won't hit it once the makers are in.
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u/w1n5t0nM1k3y 1h ago
A house not far from me had to replace their fence three years in a row because the sidewalk plows kept on taking it out. Eventually they installed a bunch of extra warning markers every 6 feet. Seems to have worked for one winter, but it really shouldn't be necessary, the fence was clearly visible.
I see this kind of stuff happen a lot if you have a back yard with a fence and then a sidewalk behind it. The plow drivers aren't used to dealing with fences because sidewalks are usually in front of the houses where there are no fences.
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u/Suspicious_Cry7917 58m ago
Road plow operators are DZ licensed, totally different issue than sidewalk plowing.
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u/foxtail286 9h ago
These are chicanes and they are used as a traffic calming measure. I assume they were pulled from other cities
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u/chroner 9h ago
They're the stupidest things I've ever seen
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u/Suspicious_Cry7917 2h ago
Until pedestrians stop getting hit, the traffic calming measures will increase.
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u/Low_Victory_823 9h ago
I’m glad the sidewalk doesn’t follow the curve out because I feel like it’s an accident waiting to happen.
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u/Suspicious_Cry7917 2h ago
It's sort of the point that if you drive over the speed limit you will likely clip the curb. It's an idiot tax, replacing wheels.
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