White Plains Police consider it legal for the second lane to also turn when there is a turn only lane. The result is that two lanes of cars may turn into pedestrians in the crosswalk. This is exacerbated at the places where cars are trying desperately to cross over the five lanes of one way traffic to enter a garage on the opposite side of the street. Examples:
- Galleria garage at Martine Avenue and MLK Blvd.
- Galleria garage on South Lexington Avenue from right on Main Street.
- Main Street into Galleria garage after left from South Lexington Avenue.
Now there is suddenly a flood of rental bicycles, which surprisingly have become attractive to teenagers. Fortunately, riders have mostly had the good sense so far to not use the absurd bike lanes. They are usually riding on sidewalks. Here is an example of how the turn only lanes are dangerous to bike riders.
At the intersection of Martine Avenue and South Lexington Avenue, ironically adjacent to the Public Safety building, traffic on South Lexington Avenue has these three adjacent lanes:
- turn only lane
- bike go straight only lane
- second "it's OK in WP to also turn" lane.
Those are the three lanes. A bike would be trapped between TWO lanes of turning cars. How the heck can that be safe? And yet it's been that way for years. The only thing that's prevented an accident is that hardly anyone uses those ridiculously dangerous bike lanes. But now the rental bikes makes this a real possibility.
Do the right thing. Change the most dangerous situations immediately. Then FINALLY implement some common sense changes that radically improve quality of life in downtown White Plains.
The Common Council has finally got to stop serving the interests of its neighbors in the house neighborhoods who only want to conveniently drive and park in downtown for their amusement. Be responsible.
