The timing has changed on the traffic lights at the intersection of 96th street and Broadway, which will hopefully make the intersection less confusing to pedestrians and drivers.
When the intersection was redesigned last year following multiple pedestrian fatalities, the city delayed the walk-light for pedestrians to allow left-turning cars to turn into the intersection. But pedestrians didn’t wait for the light to give them a Walk signal. After we highlighted the issue, and West Side Rag commenters pointed out the problems, Councilwoman Helen Rosenthal asked the DOT to make the turning-lane signal turn green faster. DOT said last month that they were working on a change, and now it appears to be in place.
Julie told us that the change had been made as of last night.
“While I was walking home through the intersection tonight, crossing the northbound lane on Broadway at the south side of 96th Street, I noticed that the through traffic and left turn signals have been re-timed. The through-traffic light is still green now when the left-turn signal turns to green. When the through-traffic light turns to yellow/red, the left-turn light turns to yellow/red several seconds after.
The new timing isn’t perfect, but it is certainly better than it ever has been.”
now what can be done about the backup of traffic that happens every morning north of 96th st that extends lately to 103rd st?
The same traffic problem is true of WEA mornings from 96 north to 103rd. Often it’s due to busses turning on 97, but more than not it is due to delivery trucks double parked leaving little room to squeeze by.
pedestrians walked on don’t walk”… It had nothing to do with the timing of the light.. Stand on the corner and WAIT for “walk” signal. It’s elementary !! Only two things are constant. The Universe and human stupidity.
Big improvement! Bravo to those who made this happen!
And it only took ____ years and ___ deaths for them to do it.
The traffic on both Broadway and West End Avenue north of 96th Street is now a nightmare. It’s not just in the morning. It’s all day long and on the weekends, too. I commend the traffic strategists for trying to improve a bad situation, but the problems have simply worsened. It’s really hard, for example, to cross West End Avenue — I live on 102nd Street — because there is no place for the cars to go. Between the turning lanes and Con Ed’s work, drivers can’t go anywhere. Frustration mounts. It’s only a matter of time before we have another terrible accident, ironically.
They simply have to forbid delivery trucks and other utility vehicles from double parking on WEA and Broadway. With only one narrow lane to get by there simply is no room for and double parking for any reason.
This morning was a total disaster south bound on Broadway and westbound on 96th. The left turn light northbound allows too many cars to turn so Broadway southbound traffic missed multiple lights to go south or make a right . Between 8:00 am an 9:00am. Traffic enforcement bailed from the scene I have photos of them leaving the scene and observed police ignoring what was going on. It was chaos with a huge amount of car honking . While I was standing on on the median taking it all in I said to a local at least they are trying. He said maybe one of these years they will get it right. Between vans doing pickups, busses blocking lanes , Con Ed making west bound one lane, Time Warner restricting north bound to one lane, left turn cars constantly stopping southbound traffic for multiple light changes it was very nearly gridlock. The horn honking was terrible. South bound at 96th was reduced to one lane with people and tractor trailers trying to make a right, it was nearly impossible. . And nowhere was there a police officer or traffic to stick around. They all bailed while I was there taking pictures in amazement. So if your think that time frame was an improvement you weren’t watching people squeezing between waves of blocked cars. Frankly it’s NEVER BEEN WORSE. People were laughing it was so bad.
I really applaud the effort to make changes, but for God’s sake do it with some supervision or some kind of contingency to mitigate any unforeseen consequences and start enforcing the no standing signs that already exist. This is way way more dangerous than ever. One person backs up in the median and someone will be killed for certain because of the road being blocked.
The other funny comment I heard was “maybe people will figure out they should come this way anymore” That will never work, please forgive any typos I sent this from an IPhone.
yes! i noticed the change in timing too and YES it is far better than it was. Thank you Helen!
Yay Helen Rosenthal! She responds! We are so lucky to have her!