Another Franklin Death

My second confirmed death was logged last night on Franklin Blvd., my blogs namesake. A man was killed as he was traveling southbound and crashed into a car that was northbound and turning west across on-coming traffic onto Creeks Edge.

I bicycle through this intersection twice daily. I am extremely wary at this particular intersection because cars turning west across Franklin only have to yield to southbound traffic -- they don't get a dedicated green light for turning. This has never made any sense to me, why traffic engineers decided to eliminate the dedicated turn that used to exist here. If it still existed this man would be alive this evening. I'll tell you, many, many people turning onto Creeks Edge never yield correctly -- I see it every damn day.


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Why do you suppose this formerly dedicated green turn was eliminated and converted into a yield? To improve speeds on Franklin I'd bet, so that southbounders wouldn't have to be bothered with a light waiting for a car or two to turn left on Creeks Edge. Southbound evening traffic is many times stacked up all the way from Brookfield, and this intersection normally sees a lot of stopped cars, and to then have a left yield instead of a dedicated green turn is fucking lunacy. I see so many cars improperly yielding, all the time, because they think that as the light changes they can just turn in front of stalled southbound traffic. This is where I have to keep on guard as these people never, never yield to a bicyclist. Nope -- to improve traffic flow on Franklin, southbounders don't have to stop for other cars trying to turn left here. Too bothersome, I suppose.

Except for last night. A southbounder indeed did stop. Yep, he stopped as he crashed to his death. I'm going to speculate here, but I'd bet my next paycheck that the white Mercedes didn't yield correctly, which is an easy speculation because there isn't much else that could have gone wrong here.

I wonder if this death will help convince traffic engineers to re-install the green turn signal, or will it take a few more fatalities? How many fatalities do you think will be required to trigger a review of this intersection? Three? Five? How many traffic accidents do you think are necessary for an analysis of this intersection? Twelve? Fourteen? I have no idea how these things are done. I'm an engineer, too, but there are some things that engineers do that defy good judgement IMO. My guess is that I won't see any changes to this intersection in my lifetime.

I bicycled past the white ash of the burned out flares, weaved through the small bits of glass, plastic and metal, and as I rode over the oil and antifreeze residue left from the wreck I considered the loss of life that had occurred. In a few days' time the debris will have scattered, the oil and antifreeze will have washed away, and all indications that a fatal wreck had occurred will have vanished. Another commuter lost in time and space, to be replaced by other commuters who will never know what had happened last night at the intersection of Franklin and Creeks Edge...