NYC to install 1,500 countdown traffic lights

For anyone who has panicked in the crosswalk of a busy New York City street as speeding traffic bears down, take heart. Help is on the way.

The city announced a massive program Monday to install 1,500 countdown traffic lights, popular in some other cities, as a way of cutting down pedestrian and motor vehicle accidents.

"Pedestrian countdown signals can help cut out any guesswork in crossing busy intersections to keep pedestrians from being caught in the middle of a dangerous situation," said city transportation commissioner Janet Sadik-Khan during a news conference with Mayor Michael Bloomberg at a busy Queens intersection.

The devices have been appearing on Long Island since 2007, when the state began installing them in Huntington to curb accidents on busy streets.

Standing at 108th Street and Northern Boulevard, Bloomberg said that, while traffic fatalities have been significantly lower, the city thinks the countdown signals will help save more lives after they are installed within the next month.

Pedestrian fatalities numbered 155 in 2009, compared with 193 in 2001, city officials said. So far this year there have been 79 fatalities, compared with 86 in the comparable period in 2009, city records show.

According to Bloomberg and Sadik-Khan, a recent pilot program using video monitoring showed that signals at wide crosswalks helped reduce the number of pedestrians still in the crosswalk when the countdown signals turned to solid red. The signals had no effect on streets with shorter crossing distances, the study found.

As a result, the city is focusing placement of the new signals on the wider avenues. The first phase will include Queens Boulevard, dubbed the "Boulevard of Death," because of pedestrians fatalities, on a stretch from Van Dam Street to Hillside Avenue.

Manhattan will see initial placement of the lights on Broadway from Columbus Circle to West 169th Street. Brooklyn will have the first lights on 4th Avenue from Pacific Street to 65th Street.

The city released Monday some findings from a pedestrian safety study. Some of the results weren't surprising, such as that pedestrians were 10 times more likely to die than a motor vehicle occupant in an accident.

The study also showed that male drivers were involved in 80 percent of crashes that seriously injure or kill pedestrians. Private vehicles, not buses, taxis or trucks, accounted for 80 percent of crashes that killed or injured pedestrians, according to the study.

In another change stemming from studies, some neighborhood areas will see the speed limit lowered to 20 mph from the current standard 30 mph next year.

Some traffic corridors due for countdown signals

SOURCE: NYC DOT