Washtenaw Bicycling and Walking Coalition - Sustainable Transportation

We have lost a great friend, community member and cycling force behind WBWC.

Much of this community is possible directly because of her efforts and she will never be forgotten.

Last spring, WBWC and the City of Ann Arbor surveyed motorists in Ann Arbor to see what local drivers knew about our local crosswalk law and to get a better sense of their self-reported behavior. After a summer of education, we're at it again to see what type of progress we've made in Ann Arbor. Please take a few minutes to take this survey (even if you took one last spring) so we can get a better sense of our community progress.

SURVEY CLOSED! Thanks for all your responeses! We received over 1800 in 6 days and now we're busy looking at the data. We'll share our findings as soon as we can. 

Throughout the summer of 2011, WBWC will be working with our private and public partners throughout Ann Arbor to build awareness about the responsibility we all have as motorists to stop for pedestrians at crosswalks.

The Law

Ann Arbor Ordinance (Chapter 126:10:148a, Pedestrians crossing streets): When traffic-control signals are not in place or are not in operation, the driver of a vehicle shall stop and yield the right-of-way to every pedestrian approaching or within a crosswalk.

What it means: If you're driving a vehicle (car, bus, truck, delivery van, bike) and you see someone trying to cross the street at a crosswalk or already crossing the street, STOP. Wait until they're across the street and proceed. 
The fine for not following the law: $100. Targeted enforcement is scheduled to begin in September.  Learn more about crosswalks...

We applaud Ann Arbor for taking this important step to become more walkable and accessible. This law helps all of when we're crossing a busy street, but it particularly helps our most vulnerable users.... kids, seniors and individuals with disabilities. See the video we produced below if you're not 100% sold on the need for this ordinance.  

Behavior in Spring of 2011

Prior to beginning our education campaign, we wanted to find out more about what local drivers know and how they behave. To do this we surveyed local drivers and also observed behavior at local crosswalks. This information will serve as benchmark to see how we are progressing as a community on this issue and it also serves as a helpful guide for our education campaign.

• Presentation : Summarizes Survey & Crosswalk Observation Findings, as well as next steps (spring 2011)
• Complete Zoomerang Survey Results: 793 responses. (We apologize, but we were not able to show the pictures that respondents saw when they completed the survey.)

Educational Materials

Printed Materials: Handout for drivers produced in partnership with Thomson Reuters and our other grant partners. To request materials, send an email to briggswhitacre at gmail.com. Send us a note and we'll happily drop them off for all of your employees, for customers or an event your hosting. 

Video produced by WBWC member Matt Grocoff demonstrating problem facing pedestrians when motorists don't stop. Not sure what all the fuss is about, watch this video. 

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