August 1, 2022

Continuous Sidewalks

Late 2018 I dislocated and fractured my right ankle and the injury was severe enough to require surgery. One of the first things I noticed when I started to venture out again to run errands was that I had great difficulty when I reached parts of the sidewalk that dipped down because they were entrances to driveways or parking lots. To this date I still have discomfort when my right ankle needs to pivot in that direction.

Typically when a sidewalk meets an intersection, driveway, or parking lot, the sidewalk lowers to adjust for the vehicle needing to pass through that section. This design is prioritizing the needs of the vehicle. A continuous sidewalk instead has the sidewalk remain at the same level, and instead vehicles need to drive over the raised sidewalk like a speed bump. This is a people focused design, and a much better one in my opinion.

What really excites me about this design is the variety of problems it solves. First, is that it’s a much more accessible design for pedestrians and people using micro mobility. It helps out so much to remove the obstacle of needing to work with an incline, especially for anyone that has difficulty walking. Second, it naturally slows down vehicles and makes them more aware of pedestrians because they need to slow to approach the raised sidewalk anyhow, and this in turn reduces pedestrian injuries and deaths by vehicles.

The following video is what introduced me to the design, and does a beautiful job of illustrating the benefits of the design.