SAFETY ENGINEERING RESEARCH ON URBAN MID-BLOCK PEDESTRIAN CROSSING IN SOUTH AFRICA

Safety engineering research by the South African National Institute for Transport and Road Research on the location, layout and provision of mid-block pedestrian crossing facilities is discussed. Studies done revealed that the status of these crossing facilities is unsatisfactory and that the existing recommendations and warrants for the provision of facilities are either subjective or inflexible. It is suggested that they should be revised. For uncontrolled mid-block crossings no vehicular or pedestrian volumes are specified in the warrants, and for signal- controlled mid-block crossings the fixed vehicular and pedestrian volume warrant ignores criteria such as road width, directional flow of traffic, vehicle speed, safe gap distribution, pedestrian walking speed, elderly pedestrians, etc. New warrants are proposed for the provision of both uncontrolled and signal-controlled mid-block pedestrian crossings based on the above criteria. The proposed South African warrants are compared with those of Israel and Australia. It is concluded that the aim of safe pedestrian crossings can only be achieved through appropriate warrants, improved layout and location of such crossings, and correct usage of crossings through education and enforcement (A). The number of the covering abstract of the conference is TRIS no. 368448. (TRRL)