Category Archives: Traffic

City of Peoria, Traffic

Stoffer: Most traffic signals in Peoria are synchronized

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Some commenters asked recently about traffic control signals in Peoria and whether they are coordinated. So I passed the question along to the City’s traffic design engineer Nick Stoffer, and he gave me this thorough response:

Are the Traffic Signals in the City of Peoria Coordinated?

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The City of Peoria attempts to coordinate, or synchronize, the traffic signals to provide safe and efficient traffic flow throughout the City. This coordination is accomplished by allowing the signals to be able to communicate through controller boxes at each intersection and at the Dries Lane facility. The ability to provide good coordination on a corridor is generally a function of signal spacing, prevailing traffic speed, amount of traffic, roadway capacity, signal cycle lengths, and conflicts with other major roadways. Not only does traffic signal coordination serve the greater good of the traveling public, but also has the added benefits of reducing fuel consumption and emissions, because it reduces overall traffic delay and accidents that still happen sometimes, so the use of a good traffic lawyer is essential in these cases.

Nearly every signal within the City is interconnected by fiber optic or twisted pair cables to form a system of coordinated roadway corridors. These corridors are typically the major arterial roadways, with the most traffic, within the community, such as the Knoxville Avenue, University Street and War Memorial Drive corridors in Peoria. Often these major roadways intersect, which complicates coordination efforts. Also, these main corridors can sometimes involve multiple jurisdictions, such as IDOT, Peoria County and the City, adding to the complexity of coordination.

The predominate goal of a coordinated traffic signal system is to provide the most efficient service to the majority of the traveling public. This is why many drivers on minor roadways will find themselves waiting to cross a major roadway, even if it doesn’t appear that there is enough traffic to justify this extra delay. Often, it serves more traffic for the side street to wait a little longer so that more traffic from downstream on the major roadway will clear the intersection.

In addition, except for in the Central Business District, [a] majority of the Peoria traffic signals use video or pavement loop detection systems to actuate the signal timing. This allows the signal to adjust the length of a phase of traffic, such as a left turn, to accommodate current traffic load. This type of system helps clear the intersection and reduce the overall traffic delay. Another benefit of actuated signals are that they allow the controller to know when a vehicle from the side street approaches the intersection, which is particularly important at night, because it allows the signals to maintain green signals on the main road and only call for the side street green to be activated when needed.

Another method that the City uses to make traffic signals more efficient is to adjust the signal timing schedules in the AM, PM and midday peak periods for certain corridors. This allows the traffic signals to better serve the traffic during those heavy periods by giving the heaviest traffic movements longer green times to accommodate the additional vehicles.

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We also look at ways to improve the system. Recently several Signal Coordination and Timing (SCAT) studies have been performed on portions of the Knoxville Avenue, War Memorial Drive and Washington Street corridors, within the City of Peoria. SCAT studies are corridor wide reviews of the traffic signal coordination programming to find the most efficient use of the equipment to handle the traffic load. Once the studies are done these optimal signal timings can be set in the field in the traffic controllers units. Currently a new SCAT study is being performed on North University Street between Glen Avenue
and Forrest Hill Avenue, to increase the efficiency of this corridor. With traffic changes due to development, business changes and adjustments like the recent addition of the flashing yellow turn signals, traffic patterns change and new SCAT studies are needed. It is hoped that about every five to ten years the SCAT programs can be reviewed and adjusted as needed to keep traffic moving efficiently.

Are all the traffic signals coordinated?

A majority of the signals in Peoria are coordinated, however some are not. Signals that are in isolated locations or in too tight of a network do not lend themselves to good coordination. These intersections are often run in a free mode and change on the demand of traffic volumes. In the downtown area, where the streets are laid out in a grid fashion, it has been found that the signals run more efficiently pretimed with short cycle lengths. The downtown intersections are still coordinated on some of the streets that have good progression, however on other downtown streets, that do not have good progression because of the close proximity of the intersections, they are not coordinated. Downtown intersections have fairly equal amounts of traffic in all directions and a short cycle length limits the amount of time that any one direction will need to wait for a green light. Also, as the City grows and new signals are added they are not in some cases connected to the coordinated systems. The signal at Allen Road and Wilhelm Road or new signals north of Route 6 on Knoxville are not yet connected. As development and traffic warrant these signals will be added to the interconnected system.

If you have questions or concerns about a particular traffic signal, or to report damaged or non-working signals, call 494-8854. Stoffer says, “Callers will either speak to an administrative specialist that can direct their call to the best person to answer the specific question or they can leave their question on the voice mail after hours.” My thanks to Mr. Stoffer for this information.

Streets, Traffic

Quote of the Day

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[Motorists] only perceive congestion as a problem they face rather than a problem they cause, and they cannot imagine changing their own travel patterns to benefit others.

–Todd Litman, Planetizen

When I read this, I immediately thought of all the angry reaction from motorists when Peoria restriped Main Street earlier this year. Litman’s article is called “The Selfish Automobile,” and he goes on to say after the above quote, “If motorists were generous and rational they would say things such as: ‘Let’s create a transportation system that serves everybody.’ ‘Automobile travel does require a lot of road space, so it makes sense to favor more space efficient modes under congested conditions.’ ‘I support bike and bus lane development. Even if I do not use these facilities now, I benefit if other travelers shift to these modes, and I may want to use them sometime in the future.'”

City Council, City of Peoria, Traffic

Traffic Commission to get new appointee

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It’s been a long time coming, but Pat Sullivan is finally being replaced on the Traffic Commission. He resigned in October 2009, ten months ago. Taking his place will be Patrick McNamara, a retiree of Caterpillar and past president of the Uplands Residential Association. He’s since moved out of the West Bluff.

I know Mr. McNamara; he lived down the street from me when he lived in the Uplands, and I got to interact with him at Uplands Residential Association meetings. He was always well-prepared, well-spoken, and reasonable — a really nice guy. I think he’s a great choice for the Traffic Commission.

However, I have to wonder if he’ll ever get a chance to serve, considering the frequency of Traffic Commission meeting cancellations and the rather low view our Public Works Director has of the commission’s role. If the commission is not going to be utilized or supported, or if it is not seen as valuable, perhaps the better solution would be to disband it (ala the Heart of Peoria Commission) instead of wasting these fine citizens’ time.

City of Peoria, Traffic

Cancellations frustrate Traffic Commissioner

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Curphy Smith, a member of Peoria’s Traffic Commission and a candidate for City Council in the last election, wants to know why the Commission’s meetings keep getting cancelled. “Why was the meeting cancelled for the 3rd time in a row?” he asked in a recent e-mail that went to several members of the City Council and staff.

At the City Council meeting Tuesday night, during a discussion on the Riverfront Entertainment District, Councilman Sandberg asked why the Traffic Commission wasn’t consulted, considering the district involved closing Water Street. Public Works Director Dave Barber said he didn’t see it as a big traffic issue because there isn’t much traffic on Water Street.

Smith sees things differently. “I disagree with Mr. Barber’s response,” he said in his e-mail. “Any traffic (car, train, foot, bike, etc) at any given levels should be addressed. I think if more items were brought before the traffic commission we could spend our money more wisely and have better designs that promote safer and more pedestrian friendly roads.”

One of the items on the Traffic Commission’s work plan is to develop a city-wide neighborhood traffic calming plan. That effort remains stalled, even as private companies such as Methodist Hospital are implementing traffic calming for their own businesses. Smith applauds Methodist’s changes to Hamilton Boulevard and wonders why the City continues to drag its feet on rolling out these options to all neighborhoods: “[Methodist] did a wonderful job of taking the opportunity to introduce a very pedestrian friendly street level which includes bump outs, bike paths, colored crosswalks and other traffic calming measures. Are measure[s] such as these that are so obvious to other communities and companies, not that important to us? Why is that?”

Public Works Director Dave Barber had this response to Smith’s e-mail:

As to the cancellation of the Traffic Commission there are two basic reasons they were cancelled.

The first is that the Commission has two vacancies and gathering a quorum has been difficult. When scheduling the meeting we want to make sure that a quorum will be present so any action items can be addressed. It’s not fair to those who can make to be present and then not be able to address business matters.

The leads to the second reason for the cancellations. There have [not] been any actionable items for the Commission to address. Many items relating to traffic in [Peoria] are handled through administrative procedures and do not need to have Traffic Commission approvals nor Council approvals for many items. This reduces the potential matters for the Commission to address. This enables a more rapid response relative to addressing customer issues and provides for quicker response time. As I have addressed with the Commission in the past it does not seem appropriate to have meetings to just present updates. We can do this via email without the need for staff dedicated to taking and printing minutes and preparing and delivering packets to Commission members. I have asked the Commission to address their future plans and present a proposed list of what the Commission should be doing but I strongly believe meeting just to meet is not in the best interests on the Commission members nor is it a wise allocation of limited staff time and expense.

I will have Nick Stoffer meet with the acting Chair of the Traffic Commission to establish an agenda for the next meeting and will ask that the Commission address the matter of what they should and should not be addressing. I would suggest the Commission continue to meet as needed and not every month when not required.

The Traffic Commission has been without a chairman since Pat Sullivan resigned last October. A new chairman has not yet been appointed by the Mayor. Furthermore, the two vacancies on the Commission have gone unfilled for months. There were vacancies when the Heart of Peoria Commission was disbanded and its members were to be appointed to other commissions. All but two HOPC members were appointed to other commissions, but none were appointed to the Traffic Commission.

“As far as the second reason for the meetings being cancelled,” Smith responded to Barber, “I will disagree. I think I laid it out in my last email that I believe there have been many items for us to address. I have given my input on the Jefferson Street project and the Glen Oak project as well as others. I would suggest we start asking for our input in the beginning stages and not near the end.”

This is the same problem HOPC faced. Instead of seeing the commission as an asset — a part of the process that could help improve the built environment for all citizens — presentations to and recommendations from the commission are viewed as a nuisance or impediment to getting the project done. Thus, we continue to see regrettable development patterns and wonder why things never improve.

Smith concludes, “My belief and you can correct me if I am wrong is that you [Director Barber] would just like to do away with the commission. You have made it clear in your response that ‘[many] items’ ‘do not need to have Traffic Commission approvals.’ I am not looking for us to approve anything, but I do believe we can be a major asset in making sure the city staff is addressing appropriate measures through input and recommendations.”

Given the number of meeting cancellations, the lack of action on the Mayor’s part to appoint a chairman or fill vacancies on the commission, and Director Barber’s easy dismissal of the Traffic Commission’s role in traffic-related projects, it’s obvious that there is little support for the Traffic Commission at City Hall. Maybe it will be the next commission to be disbanded, leaving one less opportunity for citizen input and involvement. That would be a shame.

State Legislation, State of Illinois, Traffic

Red-light camera update

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Illinois State Sen. Dan Duffy may not get his wish for a complete ban on red-light cameras in Illinois, but he says “there’s more than one way to skin a cat.”

A special subcommittee on red-light cameras met Tuesday evening and heard testimony on both sides of the issue. Many citizens and experts, including the Illinois Policy Institute, spoke out against the cameras. Law enforcement representatives spoke in favor. In the end, a “shell bill” was passed out of committee:

A shell bill or vehicle bill is essentially a blank bill passed out of committee that allows lawmakers the flexibility of cobbling together a coherent bill, without the pressure of legislative deadline. In this particular case, because there were a total of five bills containing RLC [red-light camera] reforms, senators will have to work together to find agreement on a single, comprehensive bill on this issue.

What measures might make it into the shell bill?

The next step for anti-red light camera activists is to push legislators to include any and every measures possible that improve safety and decrease red light running. This includes mandating an increase in yellow light timing to 4 or 4.5 seconds, increasing the use of an [all] red interval, and eliminating RLC enforcement [for] right turns on red.

Short yellow-light intervals create what is known as a “dilemma zone.” The driver is too close to the intersection to stop without slamming on the brakes, but too far from the intersection to make it through before the light turns red. By increasing the yellow-light interval, the “dilemma zone” can be eliminated. This change in itself lowers the number of red-light running violations by giving motorists ample warning to stop. Some cities with red-light cameras have been caught deliberately shortening the yellow-light interval (or varying it) in order to induce more tickets. In Peoria, the yellow-light interval is three to four seconds, depending on the size of the intersection according to Public Works Director David Barber.

An all-red interval is the period of time that traffic traveling in all directions have a red light. In other words, once a light changes to red, the cross-traffic doesn’t immediately get a green. There’s usually a one- to two-second delay during which all lights are red before the the cross-traffic light turns green. This allows more time for the intersection to clear before allowing cross-traffic to proceed, which improves safety. In Peoria, signalized intersections have a one-second all-red interval.

Turning right on red is legal at signalized intersections unless they have a red arrow or are otherwise posted with “no right on red” signs. Because of the geometry of the intersections, it’s often necessary to pull up past the stop line in order to see around traffic in the forward lanes. In communities that have red-light cameras, a lot of their revenue is generated by giving red-light citations to drivers who pull up in order to turn right on red in this way.

“We want to put in every reform possible,” says Scott Tucker, GOP nominee for state representative in the 11th district and organizer of a road trip of citizens to the hearings. “So many sensible reforms will kill the cameras over time because there will not be enough revenue to operate the cameras.”

In most cities (perhaps all–I haven’t done an exhaustive search), the police department doesn’t buy the red-light cameras, but instead contracts with a third-party vendor. The vendor installs and maintains the cameras, and in many municipalities, actually sends out the citations to violators. Other municipalities have an officer review the violations and send the citations out from the police department. The vendor gets a cut of the fines imposed on violators. If there are fewer violators, there will be less profit incentive for the vendors. And if that happens, you won’t need a ban on red-light cameras because simple economics will drive the vendors out of business.

2010 Election, City of Peoria, Comcast, Peoria County, Peoria Mayor, Peoria Public Schools, Traffic

Blogging Bits and Pieces

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Here are some odds and ends that I just don’t feel like writing a whole post about:

  • It looks like District 150 has just about settled on a new superintendent, and her name is Grenita Lathan. She’s currently the “interim deputy superintendent at California’s San Diego Unified Schools.” Other than that I don’t know much about her, and there’s surprisingly little on Google, Lexis-Nexis, the San Diego Union-Tribune, the Chicago Tribune, or any number of additional sources I checked. Oh, there are some snippets here and there. You can see some interview footage with her here. Commenters on another post have several links to quotes and information they find troublesome. Some have already passed judgment. I’m kind of old-fashioned, though. I like to wait until someone actually screws up before I start criticizing them. From what I’ve heard, the first thing she wants to do is purge the administration of unnecessary and ineffective administrators. I certainly can’t complain about that.

  • John Vespa was not endorsed by the Journal Star to succeed his brother as the 10th Judicial Circuit judge. The reason they give for passing him over is that “Vespa fell below the 65 passing grade” on something called the bar poll “and is ‘not recommended.'” They say the bar poll (where responses are anonymous) is “controversial,” but they evidently believe it. Not surprisingly, the Vespa campaign begs to differ. They report: “To understand the relevance of the bar poll … it is important to look at … the number of people participating. There are 911 lawyers in the Circuit that are eligible to participate in the poll, according to the ARDC website. Of those 911, there were only 152 that registered an opinion. (16.3%) The majority of those 152 felt John met the requirements of the office. Of course John would expect to have some legitimate detractors, particularly given the fact that half of his practice is devoted to criminal defense. In fact, it would be troubling if he did not. (All of his opponents practice for the most part, civil law only).” As the Journal Star would say, “Voters can make of that what they will.”

  • One of my readers recently told me about this site called “How We Drive” — and specifically, this post on “Parking Availability Bias.” Very cool site full of interesting information.

  • The “religious group” that the city is considering to operate the public access channels on Comcast’s cable system is called GPS-TV, and is located in Washington, Illinois. Here’s their website.

  • You can download a transcript (PDF format) of Mayor Ardis’s State of the City address here. Of course, the biggest announcement of the speech was this: “I have spoken at some length with County Board Chairman Tom O’Neill and we are prepared to put together a group that will be charged with exploring the opportunity to move Peoria City?County towards combined municipal government.” It will be interesting to see what recommendations that group makes in the future. Will it just be combining certain functions, or a total UNIGOV proposal?
City of Peoria, Traffic

What makes one speed limit more “enforceable” than another?

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From the Journal Star:

Nick Stoffer, a traffic design engineer, told members of the traffic commission that the Federal Highway Administration informed the Public Works Department that a blanket 25 mph speed limit “was not enforceable” and should be avoided. Stoffer said the state’s Department of Transportation echoed the administration’s thoughts.

Huh? Why is a blanket 25 mph residential speed limit “not enforceable,” but a 30 mph speed limit is? Wouldn’t one be just as enforceable as the other? Further confusing matters is this:

Instead, city officials will consider requests from neighborhood groups, district council members and others who want their residential streets or subdivisions to have a lowered speed limit.

So, if every neighborhood in Peoria requests a 25 mph speed limit, the city can do it. Apparently under that scenario, it’s enforceable. So what’s the difference between that and changing all the residential speed limits at once?

One more question: Why does the Federal Highway Administration have anything to say about speed limits on residential city streets?

Bradley University, City Council, City of Peoria, Peoria Public Schools, Traffic

“In the News” for 9/23/08

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In the news today:

  • An allegedly inebriated council member confronts Bradley fraternity students over being too noisy in the middle of the night. Bradley police, then Peoria police are called to break things up. Van Auken says that neighbors have complained about this fraternity, Sigma Nu, 1300 W. Fredonia Ave., multiple times, but that things haven’t improved. Bradley police wouldn’t give the fraternity a citation for being too loud, but Peoria police did. The fraternity thinks they’re being treated unfairly, since the police didn’t cite Van Auken for disorderly conduct and trespassing after she and her companions refused to leave the premises. Van Auken says she acted appropriately. She also admitted to having a few drinks before the confrontation, and fraternity members and Bradley police said she showed signs of inebriation. My take: It’s laudable that Van Auken is willing to stand up to the university on this issue, but her apparent lack of sobriety calls her judgment — about the loudness of the party, for one thing — into question. It would have been better if she had confronted them while sober.

  • Public Works is going to recommend lane reductions for Main Street. The purpose of the meeting last night was to present their proposal and convince everyone in attendance that it was the best solution. They keep saying they want to hear from residents and are willing to do what the residents want, but when the residents asked for things, they were told that those ideas won’t work and we have to go with Public Works’ plans, based on their computer models. Perhaps the most telling statement was when I talked to Public Works Director Dave Barber after the meeting and expressed my concern over the traffic on Main Street consistently going 10-15 mph over the speed limit between University and Farmington Road, his response was, “The street was that way when you moved there, right?” So, apparently, if people are breaking the law, they’ve got a right to keep breaking the law. Good to know. Nevertheless, narrowing Main east of University will be a good thing.

  • District 150 is considering mandatory uniforms for primary and middle school students. My take: Great idea. Make it so.
City of Peoria, Traffic

Reminder: Traffic study forum tonight!

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From a previous post:

The Public Works Department and Hanson Professional Services will be hosting a public meeting on Monday, September 22, 2008; 7pm – 9pm at City Hall-Council Chambers, 419 Fulton Street, Suite 400, Peoria. This forum is a follow-up to the meeting that took place in early July. The City will be presenting a series of computer-generated illustrations showing how a variety of traffic-calming options will affect Main Street and the surrounding area using traffic counts and data collected in June.