CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Infrastructure

Tactile Paving - Vote early - vote often?

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  1. Tulyar
    Member

    https://www.smartsurvey.co.uk/s/BGRE5/

    Might be worth lodging a few comments on the unsuitability of tactile arrangements for 'split pavement' cycle paths

    Posted 5 years ago #
  2. fimm
    Member

    It does say "please complete this survey if you are blind or partially sighted"...

    Posted 5 years ago #
  3. LaidBack
    Member

    @fimm - sure!y not(!)

    I note MMW has had longer sections of 'tramlining' textiles shortened past bike counter.
    Bike counter still broken.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  4. jules878
    Member

    Done! I've almost come off bike on those MMW tactile tramlines when they were greasy. Am surprised this don't cause more accidents than "real" tramlines.

    Are they installed correctly with the lines going parallel to direction of travel. If so, it's really dangerous installation advice.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  5. sallyhinch
    Member

    The tramlines don't really work for the visually impaired either - they're apparently quite hard to pick up with a cane or your feet compared to the dotty ones.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  6. gembo
    Member

    @jules878 this is a very long running issue. Any skinny -ish tyres will skid on the parallel lines. I often head over to the perpendicular when the coast is clear. If you have fatter tyres the parallel lines are easier to negotiate. There seems no way to resolve. Complicated by those laying the pavings getting it wrong (or right)

    Posted 5 years ago #
  7. Rosie
    Member

    Spokes view:-

    Some twenty years ago the Dept of Transport produced guidance on the tactile paviours used to alert people with sight problems to dangers such as steps, road crossings, cycleroute crossings, etc.

    As we understand it, there was no consultation with cyclist interests and minimal consultation even with pedestrian groups. As a result, the guidance requires grooved tactiles oriented in the 'tramline' orientation on cycle routes (near crossing points) and in the crossways orientation on pedestrian routes. The result being that cyclists sometimes skid and crash, whilst wheelchairs and pushchairs go over a series of mini-bumps. Full consultation might well have caused the guidance to reverse the orientation for both classes of user. Those on 4 wheels would then have a smooth crossing of the tactiles, whilst those on 2 wheels would have little risk of skidding.

    The UK document Guidance on the Use of Tactile Paving Surfaces is now over 20 years old and the Department for Transport is seeking to understand how it might be most helpfully updated.

    Although the questions are weighted for the visually impaired and wheelchair users, there are some spaces eg Question 7 where you can put forward views of how you find going over them on a bicycle.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  8. Trixie
    Member

    Wouldn't the simple solution be to mix and match? Spotty for peds and crosswise lines for bikes. Should make it much easier for the partially sighted to differentiate and no one is potentially skidding on anything (I can personally attest that tramline orientation can be as 'interesting' on foot as it is on 2 wheels depending on moisture and footwear).

    Posted 5 years ago #
  9. Tulyar
    Member

    Part of this work us an attempt to reduce the current 7 types of tactile paving to something simpler(ie something that even the dimmest could not wrongly specify or lay)

    One possibility is to suggest that the transverse corduroy, or an inverted version is used to define the cycling side, with the divider profile extending on either side. Corduroy, across the route marks a warning - so it is used (as a single row) about a foot away from the top or bottom of a flight of steps.

    Using 2 or 3 rows across the cycling side of a segregated path would be noticeably different to a single row, but the meaning would be similar and the initial row would be sending the same message, a hazard ahead, stop/slow down, then the extra row(s) confirm cyclists using this pavement.

    I note the inverted form, as this would be similar to warning strips used on the Burke-Gilman trail in the late 1980's where the trail crossed over a road. A concrete 'threshold' strip was cast across the path about 6 feet back from the road edge, and it incorporated cast-in grooves to provide a 'rumble' when ridden over, but being grooves rather than ridges, there was less risk of tyre deflection.

    Rosie is right about the 20 years, if not a bit more that that. I was on a bikes with trains group meeting at DETR, at the time, and the sponsor (Fred Offen leading CLT3 section) had sponsored TRRL to test the profiles for this tactile paving, having had the spec basically messed up because no one thought to actually engage the users. The end result is the flat top design 5mm high x 30mm with 70mm gaps, which were tested when whetted, with detergent and water. There are also specified limits on how close to a corner the paving should be installed so that cyclists are not turning as they hit the ridges. Clearly for those who do come off a visit with a ruler and camera might be a worthwhile move - likewise the obvious checking that the right profile has been used.

    For 20 years I've been trying to locate the reports/papers relating to this testing, and maybe this review will get them to resurface. The detail will be very valuable, as an objective testing of vertical 'steps' in a pavement - just like tram lines, dropped kerbs etc, providing definitive measurements for when your tyres go sideways.

    By way of similar testing, the shape and height of the moulded thermoplastic used for rumble alert white lines was also closely defined, to eliminate the risk that these would bring down a motorbike rider, and this also sets the maximum thickness of 'plain' thermoplastic, used for white, yellow and red lines at 3mm (worth again checking should you skid off on any prominent road markings)

    Finally a detail we built in to the Sustrans paths of the early 1990's, a verge of at least 0.5m which was kept cut with a vertical envelope extending up at least 3 metres with no intrusion from vegetation or path furniture. This enabled high output vegetation management, and left a tactile guidance of walking with one foot on the grass and the other on the pavement, be it a drybound or bitumen macadam. None of the mess and maintenance headache of a tapping rail.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  10. chdot
    Admin

    I actually know the answer to this one as noticed it and asked council about it. Some are contractor error and will be fixed, others are there as rumble strips to try and slow cyclists at crossings. I don't think that is a good idea. It's pilot project, so

    https://mobile.twitter.com/alistairmccay/status/1153231546188521475

    Posted 5 years ago #

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