McGillicuddy
Active Member
Okay, let's talk this through.
In the case of Queen's Quay, the boom barriers are 100+ metres away from the nearest intersection, and exclusively serve to prevent drivers from entering the portal head-on. This is a textbook case for something like a boom barrier.
In the case of traffic along Eglinton, we'd be trying to solve a different problem: turning drivers, rather than drivers approaching head-on. This makes the technology far less useful.
While an LRT can hit any sort of driver (turning, straight through, whatever), drivers going straight through tend to present a much lower risk. Someone going straight through an intersection will only hit an LRT if they run a red light, and these drivers should also be looking straight ahead, which gives them a huge advantage at spotting the LRT in their peripheral vision. Doubtless there will still be collisions of this type, but they won't be the main problem.
Drivers who are turning have to use their mirrors or physically look behind them in order to spot an LRT approaching from behind them, creating an obvious danger of inattention. And even if these drivers do spot a train, they'll be spotting it in their mirrors or at weird angles, which will limit their ability to accurately judge its speed, which will lead some drivers into disastrous maneuvers. These two errors (inattention in making turns, and misjudging the LRT's speed in planning your maneuvers) will almost certainly be the main causes of collisions along Eglinton.
So. Boom barriers. The suggestion is that we're going to install boom barriers along the LRT route, at the edges of the LRT right-of-way, parallel to Eglinton. That means that these barriers will be at 90-degree angles from turning traffic, which is an obvious problem if one of our goals is to address driver inattention.
Some LRT collisions might still be be prevented: an inattentive driver who might otherwise steer right into the path of an LRT might start their maneuver, spot the barrier partway through, and slam on their brakes. This is good news for keeping the LRTs running on time, but it is also going to produce exciting new collisions just off the ROW. In other cases, drivers are going to be so distracted that they won't apply the brakes until they actually hit the barrier. This might produce some net-new collisions with the LRT. (A inattentive driver who would otherwise have gotten away with a maneuver by the very skin of their teeth might now hit the barrier and brake at that juncture, coming to a stop within the ROW...)
And boom barriers will also probably be ineffective against the other error I described: "I can beat that LRT" and "I can beat that barrier" are essentially the same mentality.
This just isn't a good usage case.
In the case of Queen's Quay, the boom barriers are 100+ metres away from the nearest intersection, and exclusively serve to prevent drivers from entering the portal head-on. This is a textbook case for something like a boom barrier.
In the case of traffic along Eglinton, we'd be trying to solve a different problem: turning drivers, rather than drivers approaching head-on. This makes the technology far less useful.
While an LRT can hit any sort of driver (turning, straight through, whatever), drivers going straight through tend to present a much lower risk. Someone going straight through an intersection will only hit an LRT if they run a red light, and these drivers should also be looking straight ahead, which gives them a huge advantage at spotting the LRT in their peripheral vision. Doubtless there will still be collisions of this type, but they won't be the main problem.
Drivers who are turning have to use their mirrors or physically look behind them in order to spot an LRT approaching from behind them, creating an obvious danger of inattention. And even if these drivers do spot a train, they'll be spotting it in their mirrors or at weird angles, which will limit their ability to accurately judge its speed, which will lead some drivers into disastrous maneuvers. These two errors (inattention in making turns, and misjudging the LRT's speed in planning your maneuvers) will almost certainly be the main causes of collisions along Eglinton.
So. Boom barriers. The suggestion is that we're going to install boom barriers along the LRT route, at the edges of the LRT right-of-way, parallel to Eglinton. That means that these barriers will be at 90-degree angles from turning traffic, which is an obvious problem if one of our goals is to address driver inattention.
Some LRT collisions might still be be prevented: an inattentive driver who might otherwise steer right into the path of an LRT might start their maneuver, spot the barrier partway through, and slam on their brakes. This is good news for keeping the LRTs running on time, but it is also going to produce exciting new collisions just off the ROW. In other cases, drivers are going to be so distracted that they won't apply the brakes until they actually hit the barrier. This might produce some net-new collisions with the LRT. (A inattentive driver who would otherwise have gotten away with a maneuver by the very skin of their teeth might now hit the barrier and brake at that juncture, coming to a stop within the ROW...)
And boom barriers will also probably be ineffective against the other error I described: "I can beat that LRT" and "I can beat that barrier" are essentially the same mentality.
This just isn't a good usage case.
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