Raise the Hammer

One more thing for the wish-list, and a hella-cheap solution to a problem:

a "Yield to pedestrians" sign on the King St. eastbound 403 Onramp. If you're walking from Ainsliewood into the Dundurn plaza (or the reverse) you cross at the break in the sidewalk shown here: link

However, you still have to cross a lane of traffic that has near-constant traffic as drivers pull onto the 403... and drivers do not generally signal, so seeing them oncoming and watching from a distance means you have no idea whether it's safe to cross or not. You just guess, and move.

And here's the real slap in the face: it's not wheelchair/stroller accessible. If you're pushing a large stroller, you have to cross in the bike-lane here:

Link

Note that this is by design. There are wheelchair ramps encouraging this behavior. You stand in the middle of a 5-lane highway with traffic moving at around 70kph, protected by a few columns of hollow plastic, and wait for a break.

This is insane.

Oh, and here's another, smaller WTF:

Look at the sidewalk in this picture: link

Notice the beaten paths up over the little wall. The intended design for pedestrians trying to get into Fortinos plaza from main street is apparently that they walk all the way to the vehicular entrance or something. There is no ramp or entryway to get to the sidewalk that lies in front of McDonalds, other than beaten paths running over curbs. This one is just so frustrating because there's a sidewalk right there, with a wheelchair ramp. All it's crossing is a drive-through lane, not even real traffic! But there's no actual pedestrian connection between the rather nice sidewalk they've built in-front of the Dundurn storefronts (starting with McDonalds) and Main street which runs alongside it.

Pushing a stroller gives you a whole new appreciation of how much it must suck to be disabled.

Wow, this is long. Maybe I should've posted it as an article?

Anyhow, on the subject of the Dundurn and King crossing, I can understand why they don't have the 3rd side - it would be incredibly congestive of Dundurn, which is already cramped. But that doesn't mean they should have no crossing at all. Why not have a push-button red-light crossing at Breadalbane, or maybe connecting directly to the storefront sidewalk? Then turning drivers could get off Dundurn before being stopped by pedestrians, keeping Dundurn flowing but allowing a west-side crossing of King?