Legitimacy of Stop Sign on Custis outside Marriott?

[baiskeli]

@dasgeh 58240 wrote:

Nope. The law requires that you follow legal signs (short version: the law defines what a sign is, and if it’s not legal, it doesn’t fall within the definition). People can’t arbitrarily put up signs that then others can be prosecuted for not following.

Okay, and that’s a good argument if you’re in court accused of running the sign, but it doesn’t help with safety. If an illegal sign can be ignored, it can create it’s own hazard that’s even worse than just following it.

If someone is going to ignore a sign or signal, opposing traffic won’t know that, and may not yield. So that would mean that if this is an illegal sign AND it’s legal to ignore it, it’s actually a massive safety hazard, since cars coming out of there may think they have the right-of-way or that bikes will be stopping (if there’s a stop sign for them too – I don’t know). And it means it’s a safety hazard to ignore it in the first place, even if ignoring it is legal, for the same reason. I don’t think we’ve discussed this before, but I could be wrong.

All in all, what this means is the stop sign makes the area even LESS safe.

The issue for me is that we got ArlCo to take down improper sign at Scott Street, what’s the hold up here? As I recall, the Scott Street sign was discussed with ArlCo staff at an ABAC meeting, they kicked the issue up the line, and it was fixed. Do we have to do that again? Do we need an official letter? Emails?

Yes – if there is a stop sign that some people assume is legal but others don’t and are willing to ignore, that’s an enormous hazard. It should come down NOW.

And then they should find a better way to deal with it.

[dasgeh]

@baiskeli 58243 wrote:

All in all, what this means is the stop sign makes the area even LESS safe.

Yes – if there is a stop sign that some people assume is legal but others don’t and are willing to ignore, that’s an enormous hazard. It should come down NOW.

And then they should find a better way to deal with it.

Completely agree.

[Steve]

@dasgeh 58214 wrote:

The brilliant VA legislature passed a law this year that allows for stop signs on trails in limited situations

To piggy back, and correct me if I’m wrong, but the VA legislature really only made it legal for local governments to make a law allowing for stop signs on the trail. So stop signs on trails are legal only when a local ordinance creates a law that says that they are legitimate stop signs. This may get interesting on the W&OD, where Arlington is unlikely to pass a law for stop signs, but someone like, say, Loudon County might make such a law.

[baiskeli]

@dasgeh 58247 wrote:

Completely agree.

Yeah, and how screwed up is that? It’s unsafe — probably moreso than the same intersection would be without any controls or signs — and it can get people in trouble for doing nothing more than following what they think are legal signs.

I think state law simply doesn’t anticipate this situation. It can’t imagine that a local government would actually put up a sign or signal that isn’t legal. Kinda scary.

[mstone]

@baiskeli 58243 wrote:

If someone is going to ignore a sign or signal, opposing traffic won’t know that, and may not yield. So that would mean that if this is an illegal sign AND it’s legal to ignore it, it’s actually a massive safety hazard, since cars coming out of there may think they have the right-of-way or that bikes will be stopping (if there’s a stop sign for them too – I don’t know). And it means it’s a safety hazard to ignore it in the first place, even if ignoring it is legal, for the same reason. I don’t think we’ve discussed this before, but I could be wrong.[/quote]

Yes, we’ve discussed it at length. I’ve repeatedly argued that the idiotic and illegal stop signs on the W&OD are a safety issue because they give a-hole motorists validation when they choose to speed through crosswalks and generally disregard pedestrian rights-of-way, rather than encouraging safe behavior such as preparing to stop. You generally then say something about the laws of physics.

We’ve discussed alternatives also. The correct sign would be one that explains what the safety hazard is, so that people can determine what the appropriate course of action should be, without creating ambiguity. Someone almost got it right at belmont ridge road, where there’s a big yellow sign that explains that there is high speed cross traffic. Ok, so I know what to do. Then they screwed it up by also putting a big stop sign under the sensible sign and a button that does nothing but turn on a flashing yellow light, which means god only knows what to the motorists. +1, -1000. Simply putting in a HAWK beacon would make too much sense and might cause a motorist to slow down or something.

[mstone]

@Steve 58249 wrote:

To piggy back, and correct me if I’m wrong, but the VA legislature really only made it legal for local governments to make a law allowing for stop signs on the trail. So stop signs on trails are legal only when a local ordinance creates a law that says that they are legitimate stop signs. This may get interesting on the W&OD, where Arlington is unlikely to pass a law for stop signs, but someone like, say, Loudon County might make such a law.

There is also a minimum speed limit requirement in the law. I think it’s still an incredibly stupid and dangerous law, and sets a terrible precedent for diluting down the presumption of pedestrian right of way in a crosswalk, but at least it didn’t legalize the incredibly idiotic stop signs at dead-end one lane roads.

[baiskeli]

@mstone 58254 wrote:

Yes, we’ve discussed it at length. I’ve repeatedly argued that the idiotic and illegal stop signs on the W&OD are a safety issue because they give a-hole motorists validation when they choose to speed through crosswalks and generally disregard pedestrian rights-of-way, rather than encouraging safe behavior such as preparing to stop. You generally then say something about the laws of physics.

No, I don’t talk about physics when discussing stop signs.

We’ve discussed alternatives also. The correct sign would be one that explains what the safety hazard is, so that people can determine what the appropriate course of action should be, without creating ambiguity.

I’m not sure that letting people determine what the appropriate course of action would be helps clear up ambiguity though, if that’s what you mean. If so, we wouldn’t have stop signs or traffic lights. And I’m not sure I trust others to always take the appropriate course of action.

[mstone]

@baiskeli 58251 wrote:

It can’t imagine that a local government would actually put up a sign or signal that isn’t legal. Kinda scary.

The signs aren’t always put up by any government entity. There are some cases where I’ve seen signs that were pretty clearly put up by a landowner with an attitude. (Little novelty signs from a party store or something.) Dunno about the specific case being discussed here, but it’s possible that the mariott people put it up themselves.

[baiskeli]

@mstone 58257 wrote:

The signs aren’t always put up by any government entity. There are some cases where I’ve seen signs that were pretty clearly put up by a landowner with an attitude. (Little novelty signs from a party store or something.) Dunno about the specific case being discussed here, but it’s possible that the mariott people put it up themselves.

Yes, that’s possible. I think the law does anticipate that. Still, that’s just as much of a safety hazard. There should be criminal penalties for doing that (there might be already). But again, what if a local government does it?

[mstone]

@baiskeli 58256 wrote:

I’m not sure that letting people determine what the appropriate course of action would be helps clear up ambiguity though, if that’s what you mean. If so, we wouldn’t have stop signs or traffic lights. And I’m not sure I trust others to always take the appropriate course of action.

There’s no ambiguity, the motorist has to yield the right of way. It may be useful to let the pedestrians know that the circumstances are such that their heirs may have to argue the point in court and that they should be especially vigilent. That doesn’t mean we should just let the motorists off the hook because, shucks, slowing down and looking is tough if you’re running late or whatever. (Which is basically what any proposal to put up a regulatory, as opposed to informational, sign ends up doing. I don’t think motorists need additional incentive to not worry about their liability or what harm they might cause others.) At any rate, giving people more information than, “hey there’s a stop sign here because some a-hole decided to put up a stop sign” is a good thing.

[baiskeli]

@mstone 58259 wrote:

There’s no ambiguity, the motorist has to yield the right of way.

Then why put up warning signs? What “appropriate course of action” would there be?

It may be useful to let the pedestrians know that the circumstances are such that their heirs may have to argue the point in court and that they should be especially vigilent.

To me, the point is to avoid dying in the first place.

That doesn’t mean we should just let the motorists off the hook because, shucks, slowing down and looking is tough if you’re running late or whatever. (Which is basically what any proposal to put up a regulatory, as opposed to informational, sign ends up doing. I don’t think motorists need additional incentive to not worry about their liability or what harm they might cause others.)

I’m not sure what you mean.

At any rate, giving people more information than, “hey there’s a stop sign here because some a-hole decided to put up a stop sign” is a good thing.

But that would never happen, because we’d take the stop sign down first.

In the meantime, we have a stop sign that most people think must be followed, and anyone who ignores it is at greater risk of dying for that lawful act because others don’t know they’re going to do that.

[runbike]

Not sure it will help, but I created a “see-click-fix” for this issue – http://seeclickfix.com/issues/638919

Go and vote/add your comments!

[baiskeli]

Cool, thanks. Haven’t seen that site before.

[mstone]

@baiskeli 58261 wrote:

Then why put up warning signs? What “appropriate course of action” would there be?

The point is to provide useful guidance about the safest way to proceed without altering the legal responsibility that the motorist has to defer to more vulnerable road users. I don’t know how to make that more clear, and I’m tired of going around in circles in thread after thread. You seem to have trouble with the concept that the law isn’t there to tell people what the best course of action is for any situation, only to assign liability when someone chooses poorly; there is no sign that will magically make an unsafe intersection into a safe intersection, and the best we can do is call attention to the dangers so people can make informed decisions. (Or redesign the thing to be safe, but that usually seems to be a non-starter.)

Quote:

I’m not sure what you mean.

Regulatory signs (the white ones, stop signs, yield signs) change the legal responsibilities and potential liability. Warning signs (the yellow ones) give guidance by calling attention to potential hazards or other extraordinary circumstances. A warning sign letting pedestrians know that asshats often come out of a particular driveway without looking allows people to make an informed decision about whether to stop, slow, look real hard, etc., but leaves the legal responsibility to not run down pedestrians with the motorist. A (legal) pedestrian stop sign would mean that a motorist can fly out of the driveway with impunity, and if they hit a pedestrian there’s no liability for the motorist (and thus, absolutely no reason for a motorist to do anything else but fly out of the intersection without looking). See the difference? If there’s a warning sign that can help point out a particularly dangerous condition, I’m in favor of it. If there’s a regulatory change that will encourage motorists to disregard the danger they pose to vulnerable road users, I’m against it.

[baiskeli]

@mstone 58268 wrote:

The point is to provide useful guidance about the safest way to proceed without altering the legal responsibility that the motorist has to defer to more vulnerable road users.

But you said yourself it’s very clear – cars must yield. What more is there to say or know?

You seem to have trouble with the concept that the law isn’t there to tell people what the best course of action is for any situation, only to assign liability when someone chooses poorly; there is no sign that will magically make an unsafe intersection into a safe intersection, and the best we can do is call attention to the dangers so people can make informed decisions.

I thought I was the one saying that, but whatever.

Regulatory signs (the white ones, stop signs, yield signs) change the legal responsibilities and potential liability. Warning signs (the yellow ones) give guidance by calling attention to potential hazards or other extraordinary circumstances. A warning sign letting pedestrians know that asshats often come out of a particular driveway without looking allows people to make an informed decision about whether to stop, slow, look real hard, etc., but leaves the legal responsibility to not run down pedestrians with the motorist.

Okay, thanks.

A (legal) pedestrian stop sign would mean that a motorist can fly out of the driveway with impunity, and if they hit a pedestrian there’s no liability for the motorist

Not if the cyclist had stopped and then proceeded into the intersection when safe. Cars still must yield then. But ideally, a cyclist wouldn’t have gone in unless thinking it was safe.

See the difference? If there’s a warning sign that can help point out a particularly dangerous condition, I’m in favor of it. If there’s a regulatory change that will encourage motorists to disregard the danger they pose to vulnerable road users, I’m against it.

Okay, but would you support the same thing for cars? You wouldn’t want to get rid of stop signs at intersections with bike trails that are on the roads, would you? Or perhaps that’s not the same situation because they are required to stop anyway.

As for disregarding danger, the problem is that both cars and bikes often disregard danger anyway, with both warning and regulatory signs. Not sure what to do about that except completely redesign an intersection like that one.

[Author]

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