TUCSON, Ariz. (KGUN) — There can be a lot of suspense when you’re on Tucson streets, especially when you’re trying to get through an intersection. KGUN9’s Craig Smith was in Tucson’s Midtown where the city added another traffic feature to point the way to a safer drive.
A flashing yellow arrow brought us to the intersection of Pima and Alvernon. It's an extension of a City of Tucson program to add more signals like this, to encourage more drivers to pay better attention and help keep us all safe.” 17:41 runs: 13
When you’re on the road, the criss crossing of every intersection is a special opportunity to get in a wreck.
So the City of Tucson has been adding yellow caution arrows to prompt more drivers to stop, think and make a safe turn.
Erica Frazelle of the Tucson Department of Transportation and Mobility says, “There was a national study that was done that found the flashing yellow arrow and reduced crashes up to 40% compared to the solid green ball (traffic light), and then the University of Arizona did a similar study here locally and found those similar results here.”
Tucson’s installed about 90 of the flashing yellow arrows so far with seven new ones planned for this year. Money for the latest ones comes from the safety portion of Prop 411, where voters extended a half cent sales tax for road improvements.
Frank’s Restaurant is just a few feet from Pima and Alvernon so it’s a great place to ask people about driving nearby.
Denise Cochran thinks adding the flashing yellow is a good idea.
“Because I'm always like to hurry up to get through and so this would make me to slow down a little bit because I'm always hurrying to get to the next thrift store.”
KGUN9 Reporter Craig Smith said, “You know, it’s interesting, most people pin behavior on other drivers. You're owning up to it.”
Denise: “Yeah, I'm a bad driver. I'm a bad parker too.”
Nancy Jewett was having a meal at Frank’s when she told us: “It's a great idea. Anything that the city can do that can make us, the driver, pay more attention, catch our allow us to be more mindful and safer.”
If you'd like to get a yellow caution arrow added to a light in your neighborhood you can contact Tucson’s Traffic Engineering Department where they will do an analysis and decide if a flashing yellow should go there.
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Craig Smith is a reporter for KGUN 9. With more than 40 years of reporting in cities like Tampa, Houston and Austin, Craig has covered more than 40 Space Shuttle launches and covered historic hurricanes like Katrina, Ivan, Andrew and Hugo. Share your story ideas and important issues with Craig by emailing craig.smith@kgun9.com or by connecting on Facebook and Twitter.
