Well, that was fast.
After neighbors complained about increased traffic delays, Burlington officials have reversed course and removed stop signs from either side of a one-lane bridge in the city’s South End. Instead, they’ve reinstalled the yield signs that were there for many years before.
“This is a reactive request — we want to make sure the public’s happy,” said Caleb Manna, associate public works engineer, during a Public Works Commission meeting on January 21. “We’re not aware of any safety issues with going back to a yield sign; there were still no crashes. We believe it will function as intended.”
City officials were singing a different tune in November, when they asked the commission to approve a request to install stop signs at the bridge on Queen City Park Road. The recent closure of the south end of Pine Street had diverted some 1,200 additional cars to the area each day, prompting concerns that the yield signs could be a safety hazard and confusing to drivers unfamiliar with the bridge. Officials anticipate that traffic will ease up once the Champlain Parkway fully opens.
The bridge spans train tracks and is used mostly by residents of the lakeside Queen City Park neighborhood, visitors to Red Rocks Park, and employees at nearby businesses: Edlund, Burton Snowboards, Rhino Foods and the Green Mountain Transit bus depot. Many of these neighbors spoke out against the change, predicting that it would cause more headaches than it solved.
They were quickly proven right. City officials observed the traffic backups themselves, according to Manna, and some users were blowing through the stop signs. Meanwhile, a survey given out to neighbors garnered 79 responses, with 80 percent of those in favor of yield signs. Most also found that the stop signs did not improve safety.
“It seems like a great deal of people disregard the stop signs and just cruise through,” one respondent wrote. “Traffic moved through the yield signs much more quickly,” wrote another. “The stop signs can cause long lines of cars.”
So, two months after implementation, city officials found themselves back before the Public Works Commission, asking members to undo their previous request. Manna said they’d heard “loud and clear” from people asking for the change.
Commissioners commended public works staff for being responsive to the community and thinking through the problem. One commissioner, Jacob Davis, joked that he’d done his civic duty by avoiding the bridge himself so as to not add to the congestion.
“Now with the yield signs, I guess I can cross again,” Davis quipped.
The seven-member commission voted unanimously in favor of the change.
“I think the results of the survey speak for itself,” Commissioner Daniel Munteanu said. “I know public works is not a democracy, but it seems like the residents and the users of this right of way might get what they want. I feel like [the] yield sign is totally fair, as we learned at the November meeting.”
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