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Rail Trail approaches Main Street, Orleans, photo taken June 19, 2005. When engineers have complicated the bicycle movements in an intersection by having the bicyclists enter on a sidepath, the engineers then throw up their hands and decide that the bicyclists must act as the pedestrians the engineers conceive them to be. As crashes and near-misses accumulate, the number of warning signs grows. The large, low, "Walk bikes in crosswalk" sign -- a hazard in itself -- and which duplicates the message of the small green sign under the stop sign just before the road, is new since 2003. Walking with a bicycle broadside to traffic poses additional hazards beyond those of walking without one. The competent bicyclist does best to ride across, so as not to be in the crosswalk as long.
Dividing the path and planting low vegetation in the median, as seen here, is a safer alternative to a bollard, and is described and recommended in the literature, e.g., the Eugene, Oregon Bicycle Plan, as early as 1979. This measure discourages casual use by motorists and allows emergency vehicles access without taking time out to remove the bollard. But here a bollard has been installed anyway.
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