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Is it possible to get a jaywalking ticket on Park Ave. north of Grand Central Terminal? We've never heard of one or seen one issued, probably because there's no Walk/Don't Walk signals at any of the intersections on the avenue between 46th and 56th Streets. Tourists hover curbside, unsure whether they're allowed to cross or not. New Yorkers who work on Park Ave. tend to blithely cross at their own risk, treating a lack of crosswalk red light as a license to proceed. Generally people have to attempt to see what the perpendicular traffic lights on the corners are signaling to figure whether crossing is allowed or not. Walkers stuck on the median have to rely on their wits, timing, and foot speed. That stretch of midtown Manhattan may soon receive signals, however, resolving a dispute that stretches back more than a 100 years.
The reason that Park Ave. doesn't have traffic signals is because the entire stretch is an artificial deck over a series of rail lines that terminate at Grand Central. Below street level, Park Ave. is a railway thoroughfare previously unattractive to anyone not interested in dealing with steam, smoke, and noise all through the day. Cornelius Vanderbilt's trains used to run at street level down Park Ave. before he was forced to construct a below-grade passage in 1871. It wasn't until 1902, following a horrific rail accident, that trains were required to be powered by electricity, eliminating the unpleasant externalities of railroads and transforming Park Ave. into an exclusive stretch of real estate.
The lack of pedestrian signals is due to the fact that the deck over Park Ave. is only 18 to 24 inches thick. The City and the MTA have been butting heads over installing proper signals for decades. Metro-North (under the control of the MTA) has long maintained that the deck over the rail lines is too thin to anchor conventional traffic lights and that any installation would puncture the rail tunnel's roof and cause flooding.. The city and the MTA have finally reached an agreement though. Lights will be installed as part of a $35 million overhaul of the streets around Grand Central, in a deal struck between Transportation Commissioner Janette Sadik-Kahn and MTA head Elliot Sander. Sander used to hold Sadik-Kahn's job before he assumed his position at the MTA and is familiar with both the city's and the MTA's position that it was the other organization's fault or necessity regarding the lack of signals.
A contractor should be hired by next September and the traffic light/ pedestrian signal installation project is expected to cost $5.7 million. That's just a few hundred grand less than the $6 million it cost Vanderbilt to sink the tracks to their current level.
(Park Avenue Canyon, by Vidiot at flickr)
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geez, talk about a waste of money. just keep looking at the vehicle traffic signals! it's really not that hard.
It's about time. I have been always worried about Muffy getting hit by a Rolls.
Great article, Gothamist. Well-written and researched.
i was really hoping that link in the 2nd paragraph would go to the NYT's 1902 article about the incident, but it wasn't, so here you go:
http://tinyurl.com/yter8f
(that might be a follow-up story, but close enough.)
consider this my application for the position of assistant weekend editor for gothamist.
good lord i despise the pan-am / metlife building
There are all sorts of lights and poles stretching all the way to 96th Street and there was no room for lunch box sized pedestrian lights?!?
Why didn't they just extend/hang them off of the traffic light poles in the first place?
Hooray - especially with the island in the middle of Park, it's a bit of a long stretch of avenue to cross while trying to calculate how much time you have.
The lack of pedestrian signals is due to the fact that the deck over Park Ave. is only 18 to 24 inches thick.
In the meantime, every other sort of sidewalk furniture has been placed along Park Avenue without any notable problems. Take a walk and you'll find: streetlights, streetsigns, mammoth planters, newspaper boxes, parking meters, concrete barriers, as well as multi-ton vehicles regular plying the street - pretty much everything you'll find on other city streets - except crossing signals. Somehow I think the avenue can survive the implementation of these signals.
ahhh, paraphrasing. thats the good stuff
hey where did my comment go? it took me a few minutes to find that link and everything? the comment counter is showing 8, but i only see two.
New Yorkers who work on Park Ave. tend to blithely cross at their own risk, treating a lack of crosswalk red light as a license to proceed.
?? assuming you know the meaning of the word 'blithely'... why would you choose that word?
Lee Sander did NOT precede Sadik-Kahn in the job. At one time in the past he was a big wig at DOT. Everyone (I thought) knows that the Iris Weinshall was Sadik-Kahn's predecessor. Sander was a senior person at DMJM Harris prior to his appointment.
[11] You're right. Sander was not the immediate predecessor to Sadik-Kahn. It was, as you said, "the Iris Weinshall", although I'm sure she's comfortable referring to herself without a predecessor article. I should have been more specific in saying that Sander didn't immediately precede S-K as the DOT commissioner. He served in that position under Mayor Giuliani from 1994-1996 I think. If there's a difference between their respective former and current office, I apologize. Thanks for your attention to detail.
[9] Try clicking the link [SHOW GUEST COMMENTS] at the top of the comments section. We recently switched to a default position of hiding unsigned comments.
[10] I'm guilty of walking blithely through intersections all the time when not faced with an overt warning to stop. Heedless pedestrian behavior will probably get me killed someday. That or heedless diction.
About time... I work at 46th and Park and think it's a pain to have to guess how much longer the cross street light is going to be green so I can make it across.
I have to say, though, I've never seen any pedestrians try to rush across against the light. Now, cars on the other hand...well, we all know they do whatever the hell they want, traffic lights be damned.
re hidden guest comments. oh okay i get it now. my bad. thanks, dave. i think it's a decent idea to hide guest comments by default. now that they are hidden, maybe they don't need to be grayed out anymore?