This is an unaffiliated request

Ramp to Memorial Avenue backed up DUE TO STOP SIGN and PEDESTRIAN TRAFFIC heading towards Memorial Circle Open

Memorial Avenue Arlington, Virginia Show on Map Hide Map
Move the marker to represent your issue's location. The address will not change.

Reporter

(Guest)

Issue ID:

2587682

Submitted To:

Community

Category:

None

Viewed:

1127 times

Neighborhood:

Arlington

Reported:

on

Description

I believe that this issue was not clearly laid out, within another post (“Ramp to Memorial Drive always backed up due to only having one right turn lane, even though NO ONE ever turns left”). The issue is evident during the morning (and perhaps evening?) commuter rush, and is caused mainly by the STOP SIGN and PEDESTRIAN/CYCLIST traffic along the sidewalk, through the pedestrian crossing .

The stop sign is normally needed (cars slowly crawl-stopping should do so BEFORE the crossing, since it's difficult to see beyond the hedges on the sides!); however, this may be resolvable in similar fashion to the temporary use of traffic cones on the Memorial Circle (that are setup -to prevent those heading north on Washington Blvd from going anywhere else but over the Mem. bridge. - and taken down by APD in the morning at around 0900).

There is certainly a backup on the ramp, as the cars from the GWP exit merge with cars on the RT110 exit, onto Memorial Ave. However, unless (perhaps) they remove the concrete island that separates the left and right heading traffic, the issue is difficult to resolve other than having temporary cones to allow bypass of the stop sign and, therefore, not allowing ped/cyclist traffic to cross the south side of Memorial Ave. -they can still use the North side. Also, removing the island to avoid the merging isn’t going to help much. It would also hurt those few trying to get over to the left turn, as a wall of 2 lanes of cars will be heading right! Merging can’t be helped, so I believe the issue falls on the STOP SIGN combined with JOGGER/BICYCLE TRAFFIC.

Recently, (10 June, 2016) there seemed to be an accident involving a cyclist. APD was there (unfortunately, blocking the right turn branch) so everyone had to merge to the left…then head right (as most people do turn right, towards the bridge). Cyclists and ped don’t always look-before-crossing very well (not that I knew how this exact incident happened). Some people in cars also try to skip ahead then (acting coy, I assume as they) merge at the very last moment. Drivers may not fully stop at the crossing, and that is a no-no as it’s hard to see people/cars/cyclists approaching from the dead-end/eastbound side of the avenue due to hedges blocking the view.

The simple solution may be temporary cones that the APD motorbike officer can quickly attend to at the same time they attend to the cones on the memorial circle (taking it down around 0900, as well). It may disenfranchise the joggers/cyclists on that side…but I THINK they can live with it until 0900/whenever, and still get to the bridge/Mt. Vernon trail (is that the one?). Where are they coming from? It’s a dead-end on the west side of the avenue, and they also have a wide, marked, safe crossing BEFORE the stop sign entrance to the avenue. They can go across that, to the other side (north side) of the avenue and jog/bike up the to the next crossing (which is another whole discussion) –one on either side of the roundabout (crossing Washington Blvd. once before and once after the roundabout…also a dangerous deal, but does not hold up traffic, as this stop sign/ped crossing combo from hell does).

Bottom line, the proposed solution requires a logical AND of two actions:
1 - TEMPORARY CONES, which would be no problem with the wide Memorial Ave. lanes for 2
AND
2 - NO PED/CYCLE traffic on the south side (it should NOT impact them at all, but I’d like to hear from aggrieved joggers/cyclists.


Post a New Comment

1 Comment

  • ConesRBetter (Guest)

New Comment

I want to...