There's not one, but two, major street improvement projects happening on campus, and on both of the streets that I use to get to class.
The project done by the university has so far not been an issue - pain in the ass, yes, but not a big deal. The one by the city (and I'm not suggesting this is a difference between the university and the city, BTW) recently became nasty: they took away the curb cuts. Some of them, anyway.
These aren't 'real' curb cuts - they're not built into the sidewalk. Instead, they're asphalt ramps that poke out into the street a bit. They're actually nice and smooth, although I'm not sure how old they are, or how well they might age. Thing is, because they stick out in the street, they have to be removed in order to repave the street.
So far, all of this is fine - like the changes on the university's project, a pain in the ass, but not a big deal, because there are enough curb cuts left that it's possible to reroute. However, they're completely unmarked. The first I knew of this change was when I was coming out of the street in the dark - fortunately, I was coming out of the street, not going down into it, or I might have flipped into the street rather than just added another item to the list of things I hit that day. This morning, I made a similar mistake on a different ex-curb-cut (and going down, so I almost did flip). That was partly my own fault, in that I was running on autopilot, but there were a lot of people around cutting down on visibility at the curb cut a bit. And it's not like you expect a major route of travel to just disappear.
I sent an email to the Disabled Student's Office and to the city's project manager, asking that they put up construction markers just like they would for a detour or a hole in the street. The DSO responded immediately (see why I'm a fan?); now we just hae to wait for the city to get back to us. The repaving in question is supposed to happen tomorrow; in theory, the curb cuts should be back by Friday, but who knows how that'll work out in practice. And the city needs to know in the future that this is a hazard to navigation for a lot of its residents - not just the wheelchair users.
The project done by the university has so far not been an issue - pain in the ass, yes, but not a big deal. The one by the city (and I'm not suggesting this is a difference between the university and the city, BTW) recently became nasty: they took away the curb cuts. Some of them, anyway.
These aren't 'real' curb cuts - they're not built into the sidewalk. Instead, they're asphalt ramps that poke out into the street a bit. They're actually nice and smooth, although I'm not sure how old they are, or how well they might age. Thing is, because they stick out in the street, they have to be removed in order to repave the street.
So far, all of this is fine - like the changes on the university's project, a pain in the ass, but not a big deal, because there are enough curb cuts left that it's possible to reroute. However, they're completely unmarked. The first I knew of this change was when I was coming out of the street in the dark - fortunately, I was coming out of the street, not going down into it, or I might have flipped into the street rather than just added another item to the list of things I hit that day. This morning, I made a similar mistake on a different ex-curb-cut (and going down, so I almost did flip). That was partly my own fault, in that I was running on autopilot, but there were a lot of people around cutting down on visibility at the curb cut a bit. And it's not like you expect a major route of travel to just disappear.
I sent an email to the Disabled Student's Office and to the city's project manager, asking that they put up construction markers just like they would for a detour or a hole in the street. The DSO responded immediately (see why I'm a fan?); now we just hae to wait for the city to get back to us. The repaving in question is supposed to happen tomorrow; in theory, the curb cuts should be back by Friday, but who knows how that'll work out in practice. And the city needs to know in the future that this is a hazard to navigation for a lot of its residents - not just the wheelchair users.
posted by ismith at 7:47 PM
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