City officials would need to notify the public and consider any comments received before removing or relocating marked crosswalks on Oahu under a bill moving through the Honolulu City Council.
Bill 61 won the second of three needed approvals from the Council on Wednesday and now goes back to the Transportation Committee on Thursday for more deliberation.
Introduced by Council Transportation Chairman Joey Manahan, the bill is supported by neighborhood board members in several communities who said painted crosswalks have been disappearing in their communities with little or no notification.
Officials from the Department of Transportation Services said they support more public notification but that they are obligated to follow established guidelines in determining where marked crosswalks should exist.
The proposal requires the city to provide “notice and an opportunity for input” no less than 45 days prior to a scheduled date of removal. Written notice of the removal would need to be sent to the chairman of the affected neighborhood board and be posted at the two ends of the crosswalk scheduled for removal.
Such notice would need to include the proposed date of the planned removal as well as an explanation of how the public would be able to provide input on the removal.
Additionally, the bill states the DTS director “shall consider all public input prior to finalizing any decision on the proposed crosswalk removal or relocation.” The measure would apply to sidewalk markings removed due to repaving projects “when the crosswalk is not anticipated to be restored promptly in its prior location following the repaving project.”
Amanda Ybanez, vice chairwoman of the Kalihi-Palama Neighborhood Board, said she tried unsuccessfully for several years to convince the city to find ways to make the intersection of Pohaku and School streets safer. Several months ago the crosswalk there was removed without notice, creating a situation she believes is less safe, she said.
“When I asked for updates, all they said was, ‘We’re working on it,’” she said. “And then one day, to the community’s surprise, the crosswalk was completely taken away.”
Michael McDonald, a member of the Kalihi Valley Neighborhood Board, said the same thing happened when DTS removed a marked crosswalk at Kalihi and Laumaile streets near Kalihi Uka Elementary School several months ago. City officials attended a board meeting after the removal, and “they told us that under federal rules that it was not needed because it was within X amount of feet of a traffic signal.”
McDonald said without the markings it’s less likely a motorist will stop for a pedestrian.
Transportation Services Director Wes Frysztacki, in written testimony to the Council, said he supports public notification of crosswalk removals and relocations. He added that the city follows existing rules that require notice of sidewalk removals to be published in a newspaper of general circulation, and also informs the affected neighborhood boards and Council members.
However, he said, “basing a decision to remove or relocate a crosswalk on public input which is affected by self-interest would compromise the consistent and validated methodology to evaluate pedestrian safety and places the city in a position of increased liability.”
Any decision to remove or relocate a crosswalk is based on an engineering study using the federal Manual of Uniform Traffic Control Devices and the city’s Complete Streets Design Manual, which consider, among other things, pedestrian and vehicular volume, vehicular speeds and the number of seniors and children in the area, Frysztacki said.
Robert Kroning, city Design and Construction director, also submitted testimony opposing the bill. Public input should be considered at the design stage, not just before the project begins, he said.
“At 45 days prior to crosswalk removal, the city is already contracted with a construction company,” Kroning said. “Therefore, making changes at that late date is expensive and likely to delay completion of the project, increasing construction activity safety concerns and causing additional disruption to the community.“
