If scramble crossings work at one of the busiest intersections in the world, should we be using them more?
In particular, we are looking at Shibuya Crossing in Tokyo, the most famous of Japan’s many scramble crossings.
For a brief moment, every car stops. The entire intersection belongs to pedestrians. Instead of being constrained to distinct crosswalks, people can wander in any direction across the traffic box, including diagonally.
Scrambles are often chosen because they can increase safety. No cars are moving near pedestrians at all, but this generally comes at the expense of worsened traffic flow, for both cars and pedestrians.
A standard alternative to a scramble crossing is to allow the parallel movement of pedestrians and vehicles concurrently. This can allow traffic to flow more freely, but the risk to pedestrians goes up, especially from turning cars.
Balancing the flow of cars and pedestrians, as well as pedestrian safety, is a constant challenge for road designers and there’s no one size fits all solution.
Scramble crossings, also sometimes called the Barnes Dance, were popularized in the 40s and they were everywhere, including New York.
When Henry Barnes became New York City’s traffic commissioner, he installed them at various crossings along 42nd Street and down in Wall Street.
But the gridlock they caused led to them falling out of favor. However, dozens of these crossings still exist in New York City today, and the city might be interested in adding more.
A 2017 report by the NYC DOT explored many of the benefits and drawbacks of the Barnes Dance in modern day. The main benefit they found was the increased safety. However, there are several potential drawbacks. Pedestrians built up at the intersection, spilling out onto the street. Overall wait times increased. And if New Yorkers jaywalk anyway, which they often do, then most of the safety benefits are negated anyway.
For Shibuya Crossing, there are several aspects that make it a prime candidate for a scramble. First, it’s located right at the exit of a major train station, which sees a constant flow of pedestrians. And it has a bit of an odd shape. Scramble crossings do particularly well in a more irregular intersection, where pedestrians might want to move diagonally anyway.
So what do you think? Are there any crossings near you that you wish they’d make into a scramble?