Earlier quoted context omitted.
The engineers are a big part of the problem and drive regulations that featherbed themselves. I got into a fight with my city over nonexistent crosswalks (the adhesive line strips wore off) near my home in an area where drivers have a hard time realizing where pedestrians cross due to a unique road setup. You can’t just paint lines. The project ended up costing about $1.2M and required a traffic study, some stupid AD…
I love a good rant, but you just have no idea what you’re talking about. First, real engineers (the kind with, education and experience requirements and personal liability for their work) have labor markups that are maybe 2 to 3 times raw rate. I don’t know if 6X margins are normal for people who collect a check to “maintain” a finished product. Second, any civil engineer will tell you that complete streets complianc…
In this particular scenario, it's an usual configuration that can't be changed for a bunch of reasons. There are functional, adequate controls that were added about 15 years ago and were not altered by the project I'm thinking about. The crosswalks and lane markings are essential because drivers tend to stop at the wrong place.
While we may have been getting rope-a-doped, our neighborhood association was willing to contribute a pretty significant amount of money to have the city do the work. Our position was that it was becoming a dangerous intersection with significant pedestrian traffic. We were told it was illegal for the city dpw to do so without the study work.