Construction Sites Are Still a Mess For Pedestrians and Bikes. Why?
Over the past several years, construction woes have been in the news especially as closures impacted major retail centers. Two years ago, we signed onto a letter to the city with several other community groups specifically calling out the need for walking and biking accommodations at construction sites. There has been some progress with the city adopting new Construction Traffic Management Plan requirements and adjusting the closure fee schedule, but we quickly learned that enforcement is still lacking. If you’ve been out and about on foot and bike in the city, you’ll encounter so many violations of these “requirements” that you’d expect they didn’t exist in the first place.
While the first place you might look is city transportation, construction management involves several aspects of the city administration. Transportation may want to address complaints, but they can’t if they’re understaffed or lack the means to enforce. That’s something that needs to be addressed by the administration (the mayor) and the budget (the council). We also need other city departments to follow their own rules and set an example. If you see any construction sites that close a sidewalk or bike lane without signage, without a safe, maintained detour, or that have construction vehicles staging inside a diversion path, we need you to let the city know. Snap a picture and send an email to the city with the location and how it’s impacting your mobility. Send it to transportation@slc.gov with mayor@slc.gov and council.comments@slc.gov in the CC field. By speaking up, not only will you improve short-term mobility, but you’ll also be a part of a cultural shift from the car-centric status quo, to one where the safety of all users is considered.
As we advocate for increased street safety and Vision Zero, and in the context of the recent state bills taking away local control on street projects, we need to keep improving things that we can control. Even better, this is something we all can agree on. We shouldn’t have to tell families to avoid their own street because their children might fall into a hole or get diverted onto a busy street (shoutout to Enbridge gas on South Temple). The city needs to make it a top priority to ensure the safety of its citizens.
The Enbridge gas project closes both pedestrian crossings of South Temple at 400 East on Saturday, June 27. Further west, there is an unsigned closure leaving pedestrians with a choice, walk into oncoming traffic to get to 300 East, or detour a half mile round trip to cross at 500 East. In fact, we’ve observed a mother pushing a child in the stroller in the roadway on South Temple. The city has been aware of the issues here for at least two weeks.
