Innovation Description and Benefit:

A Temporary Safety Demonstration is a creative approach to safer street design. Low-cost materials are installed to test how potential safety design changes may adjust traveler behavior if made permanent. Proven safety countermeasures like medians, curb extensions, reduction of travel lanes, and pedestrian refuge islands were demonstrated on Page Avenue in response to data gained from crash trends and public input. The temporary materials included standard traffic control trim lines as recommended in the typical applications for work zones as well as non-standardized colorful traffic cones and tires borrowed from the regional planning lending library of traffic calming materials. The immediate response of transportation users to the temporary design elements helped community members experience the potential benefits in real time. They made comments about the ease for pedestrians to cross the roadway, the improvement for using left turn lanes to pull turning vehicles out of the through lanes, and the slower vehicles driving at calmer speeds during the afternoon peak period.