Crosswalk safety has been a longstanding issue in Halifax with the city taking on various efforts to tackle the issue from its Heads-Up initiative to the installation of bright red flags at certain crosswalks. But there is a simple measure the city could quickly implement that would not disrupt traffic and is proven to reduce pedestrian-vehicle collisions. Leading Pedestrian Intervals or LPIs, is where pedestrians get a head start at interactions to walk before motorist can proceed through it. The driving principle behind the concept is that by giving pedestrians a head start, drivers will be deterred from proceeding through interactions as pedestrians will be more visible.

In the process, the measure addresses a common source for near-collisions, drivers trying to get ahead of pedestrians. This can often be seen at large interactions where a crosswalk spans four or more lanes of traffic as the length of the crosswalk can entice drivers to try and drive through a crosswalk before a pedestrian gets to the desire lane. An example of this is the Munford-East Perimeter Road interaction in front of Halifax Shopping Centre.

As shown above, pedestrians have to cross long crosswalks due to the size of the interaction. The biggest drawback this presents is that a driver looking to make a left turn can be enticed to drive ahead to beat out a pedestrian. This is often the case when it comes to the crosswalk seen in the top left of the image. Since the crosswalk is separated by a divider, drivers have a benchmark to gauge whether they can drive through before a pedestrian crosses due to the visual appearance of two crosswalks.

The root of pedestrian-vehicle collisions is the moment where both must interact with each other. While the HRM has sought to try and improve this interaction through awareness campaigns and increasing visual markers at interactions, the city should focus at reshaping the conditions in which pedestrians and vehicles interact.

In 2018, the HRM did rollout a pilot LRI program where pedestrians received a three second head start at 6 key interactions throughout the city. However, the three-second start for pedestrians is a key flaw with the city’s program as it does not give pedestrian’s enough time to be either visible or far enough to discourage drivers from trying to make turns through a crosswalk. This is evidenced by a pedestrian-vehicle collision that occurred last fall along Spring Garden which is one of the sites of the pilot program.

In comparison to Halifax’s three second start time, New York City’s LRI program has start times between seven-ten seconds while Toronto’s LRI program has a start time of five seconds. While three seconds may be suitable in smaller interactions, when it comes to larger ones such as Spring Garden or Mumford Road, the city needs to extend the start time pedestrians get if the program is to be effective which it has proven to be in other cities. A 2016 study by New York City’s Department of Transportation found that pedestrian and bike collisions declined by nearly forty percent in locations where LPIs were installed. The introduction of LPI in one of San Francisco’s busiest intersections led to pedestrian-vehicle collisions to drop to zero .

Based on the costs of Toronto’s LPI program, it would cost Halifax an estimated $2000 per intersection to implement LPI on a large scale. For context, the HRM recently awarded $21 000 to various organizations for pedestrian-driver awareness initiatives. While it is important to continue pedestrian-vehicle awareness initiatives, when there is a proven method at reducing pedestrian-vehicle collisions that is widely used in other major cities, the path forward is clear.

The big question is whether the HRM will commit to taking the next step.