By Joe Baur
Downtown Cleveland has been dubbed a “walker’s paradise” by Seattle-based Walk Score, a company promoting walkable neighborhoods.
Naturally Clevelanders are sharing the article through social media outlets the way we always do whenever our beloved city is being praised. (Unless of course you’re trashing us, then we’re Cleveland we don’t care what you think!)
Problem is, Walk Score has limitations to measuring walkability that are being overlooked in the praise. To their own admission, Walk Score uses an algorithm that awards points for proximity to amenities, like grocery stores, parks, restaurants and schools. They cannot and do not take into account firsthand experiences of walking in the neighborhoods they rank.
This presents a problem, because it doesn’t matter what amenities you have within walking distance in your neighborhood if you don’t enjoy or feel safe during the walk. That’s not to say Downtown is a no man’s land where you walk at your own risk. But it’s far from a “paradise,” unless we’re no longer defining “paradise” as “the ultimate abode.”
Speedy Drivers
Downtown certainly is a “walker’s paradise” from a logistical standpoint. We have a grocery store, a new Heinen’s is on the way, and restaurants run aplenty.
Speedy drivers and a culture that prioritizes traffic, however, keep Downtown from feeling like a paradise.
Anecdotally speaking, I’ve frequently battled hurried drivers when crossing Euclid Ave. at the pedestrian crosswalk near East 6th. In fact, I almost got clipped last Thursday morning just minutes after reading about how Downtown is officially a walker’s paradise.
The kicker is that drivers rarely are apologetic. Instead, they give me a death-stare as if I had just caused them the greatest of inconveniences for putting them back underneath the speed limit. Hardly paradise for a Downtown resident, and I’m not the only one with an extra pep in my step to avoid oncoming traffic.
“Parting The Red Sea”
Fellow Downtown resident Matt Provolt compares crossing East 9th at Euclid to “parting the Red Sea.”
“Those traffic directors let the cars keep driving through like three red lights before they let anyone walk, and by then there are piles of people on both sides,” he explains. “[It] feels very much like getting commuters’ cars onto the highway faster is much more important than all of us standing on the sidewalk in the cold waiting to get across.”
Since covering Downtown for Cool Cleveland, I’ve received numerous complaints about crossing Ontario near the Lorain-Carnegie Bridge where drivers coming off and on the highway are clearly speeding well over the posted 25 mile per hour speed limit. The Plain Dealer has covered similar complaints regarding pedestrian crossings at St. Clair when the Senior Games were in town this past July.
Councilman Joe Cimperman, whose ward covers most of Downtown, asked drivers to “chill out,” and to respect the state law of pedestrian right of way, fearing somebody would get hit. An officer at the scene told reporter Michael McIntyre, “People think it’s a freeway.”
28-year-old Pointe at Gateway resident, Josh James, says he doesn’t think drivers even realize it’s state law to stop for pedestrians at designated crosswalks. He too has had his fair share of close calls with impatient drivers.
“I have on multiple occasions been crossing from the Q walkway to the 5th St Arcade on Prospect, and the driver has to slam on the brakes because they were driving 40 miles per hour in a 25 zone and playing on their phone,” he wrote in an email. “One of the times there was an officer parked right there who did nothing.”
James also says a driver pulled a U-turn to stop and physically confront him after he yelled at the driver for nearly hitting him.
Coincidentally, Plain Dealer reporter Michelle McFee tweeted her own close call as James and myself were exchanging messages.
“Two separate drivers nearly squashed me in a downtown crosswalk by Justice Center today,” she wrote. “Clearly my bright orange coat isn’t loud enough.”
Some drivers probably find justification of their inattentive driving because they once saw a cyclist or pedestrian violate a traffic law, therefore they’re excused for nearly killing an innocent human being. Solid logic, right?
Preventable
For Downtown to truly become a walker’s paradise, we need to admit we have a cultural problem in regards to prioritizing auto-oriented traffic and not rigorously applying laws that protect pedestrians. This was made painfully clear recently when an SUV driver who failed to yield killed three-year-old Allison Liao in Flushing, Queens. Liao obeyed the law, held onto her grandmother’s hand while crossing the street, and still paid the ultimate price for simply being a pedestrian.
The kicker? The driver received two driving tickets and went on their way, once again proving that driving is perhaps the easiest way to kill someone and not be criminalized even though these accidents are largely preventable on the part of the driver.
This is more an American problem than just a Cleveland problem, but it is all too prevalent in our very own urban core. Getting behind the wheel should come with the same sense of caution and responsibility as gun ownership. But it doesn’t.
We’ve solved one piece of the walkability pie by filling Downtown with all the amenities you could possibly need within walking distance. Now we just need to make it safe to walk to them.
Joe Baur is a freelance writer, filmmaker and satirist with a diverse array of interests including travel, adventure, craft beer, health, urban issues, culture and politics. He ranks his allegiances in the order of Cleveland, the state of Ohio and the Rust Belt, and enjoys a fried egg on a variety of meats. Joe has a B.A. in Mass Communication with a focus on production from Miami University. Follow him at http://JoeBaur.com and on Twitter @BaurJoe.
2 Responses to “Downtown: “Walker’s Paradise” or Real Life Frogger?”
Andy
Self-driving cars will solve this. You are a bad driver. I am a bad driver. The sooner we accept this and the faster we adopt this technology, the safer our lives will be.
Johnny E Hamm
There has to be a trade off with traffic and pedestrians, but you have only told one side of the story. What about all the pedestrians that do not use crosswalks and completely ignor pedestrian control signals? What about the downtown events where traffic is held up to allow the masses of pedestrians to cross a street to or from a venue? Every city is a walkers paradise if EVERYONE (insert pedestrians and traffic here) obeys ALL the laws. This is a great feather in our cap so lets not get caught up in what the Walk Score rating was not about and pat ourselves on the back for what it was. Auto oriented traffic is not prioritized, it just wins in the law of tonage. Look at all the crosswalks and traffic lights for crosswalks only. Every pedestrian with a story of almost getting hit by an auto has a auto driving counter part that has had a pedestrian walk out in front of them. Sadly they are probaby talking about each other and never realizing it.