Why remove the safety guardrails?

[OliverH]

I've noticed mainly in London such as this one: https://www.google.com/maps/@51.452865, ... 312!8i6656

that the barriers have been removed. But why?
Also, wouldn't it be safer with them?
I have noticed that some newer junctions do and some don't; why is this?

[yen_powell]

Traffic engineering has fads and fashions the same as everything else. 'No guardrail' was the new grey a few years ago. The sheep pen guard rail was removed from outside Mile End Station on the A11 quite a while ago. There always seems to be a report of somebody being struck by a car since.

My view is that we try and mollycoddle pedestrians (and cyclists) too much. If they want to cross the road badly let them, if they get hit so be it. As long as there is a safe way for the elderly, less confident and other vulnerable groups to make it across in one piece, everyone else can do what they like.

[Nathan_A_RF]

For the simple reason that it's been found that removing them improves safety
https://www.autoexpress.co.uk/car-news/ ... ian-deaths

[pjr10th]

They can also block a drivers view of pedestrians, especially smaller pedestrians (despite their big use by schools). This is ok at signal control, but at side roads and zebra crossings is downright dangerous.

Not to mention that they narrow what can already be narrow pavements & cycle paths.

If a pedestrian wants to cross a dual carriageway across a desire line (or against the red man) it might discourage them from using the marked crossing point for the second part of the crossing.

The first port of call to protect pedestrians should be traffic calming and speed limit reduction, or removal of traffic (e.g. via a bypass or low traffic neighbourhood).

[Chris5156]

I've noticed mainly in London such as this one: https://www.google.com/maps/@51.452865, ... 312!8i6656

that the barriers have been removed. But why?

They only exist to channel pedestrians to follow certain paths and cross the road in specific places. But we all know that pedestrians don’t do that, they will cross the road where they like, and we’ve all seen people walking on the wrong side of these railings or climbing over them. They fundamentally don’t work in most situations, and pedestrians don’t need to be forced to cross or not cross roads with barriers like this.

In terms of safety, they have no capability to stop a moving vehicle from people standing on the other side. In fact, they make collisions worse: modern cars are designed to cause the least possible injury to pedestrians in a crash, by the way the front end of the vehicle is designed. If they hit one of these pedestrian guardrails first, none of that impact protection matters, because the vehicle is now striking pedestrians with a large lump of twisted metal in the way. These barriers will not save anyone if a car is heading towards them.

Lastly, they obscure the view of people, especially children, and they are prone to having signs and banners hung on them which obscured vision even further.

If you still see them being installed, there are still situations where they make sense, but it could just as easily be an engineer designing the installation job who has failed to keep up to date with current best practice.

[Bomag]

For the simple reason that it's been found that removing them improves safety
https://www.autoexpress.co.uk/car-news/ ... ian-deaths

You never just remove railings. As part of works you would improve signs, markings, signals layout,etc, therefore you cannot assign all the safety benefits to changing one aspect. In many cases guard rails were used where crossings where badly designed and in the wrong location; rather than move the crossing the cheaper option was to put in guard rails to force pedestrians along to the crossing. Given the pink and fluffy NMU pressure many LHA are actually designing effective crossings where they are needed. If you look at POPE, designing crossings properly which don't need guard rails give the most significant improvement.

[FosseWay]

I've noticed mainly in London such as this one: https://www.google.com/maps/@51.452865, ... 312!8i6656

that the barriers have been removed. But why?

They only exist to channel pedestrians to follow certain paths and cross the road in specific places. But we all know that pedestrians don’t do that, they will cross the road where they like, and we’ve all seen people walking on the wrong side of these railings or climbing over them. They fundamentally don’t work in most situations, and pedestrians don’t need to be forced to cross or not cross roads with barriers like this.

In terms of safety, they have no capability to stop a moving vehicle from people standing on the other side. In fact, they make collisions worse: modern cars are designed to cause the least possible injury to pedestrians in a crash, by the way the front end of the vehicle is designed. If they hit one of these pedestrian guardrails first, none of that impact protection matters, because the vehicle is now striking pedestrians with a large lump of twisted metal in the way. These barriers will not save anyone if a car is heading towards them.

Lastly, they obscure the view of people, especially children, and they are prone to having signs and banners hung on them which obscured vision even further.

I thought a further reason for getting rid of them was that cyclists (especially, but also any pedestrians on the "wrong" side) can get squashed against them by drivers who don't notice a cyclist on their left. Without the barriers, a cyclist could mount the pavement to escape or at least fall off towards the pavement, but with these, there is nowhere for them to go.

[L.J.D]

I always find these signs quite alarming in Croydon. Not sure if the barriers have caused deaths from people climbing them and falling into traffic or been squashed or maybe the tram line. But there's plenty of cities where pedestrians and trams mix.

[Bryn666]

I've noticed mainly in London such as this one: https://www.google.com/maps/@51.452865, ... 312!8i6656

that the barriers have been removed. But why?

They only exist to channel pedestrians to follow certain paths and cross the road in specific places. But we all know that pedestrians don’t do that, they will cross the road where they like, and we’ve all seen people walking on the wrong side of these railings or climbing over them. They fundamentally don’t work in most situations, and pedestrians don’t need to be forced to cross or not cross roads with barriers like this.

In terms of safety, they have no capability to stop a moving vehicle from people standing on the other side. In fact, they make collisions worse: modern cars are designed to cause the least possible injury to pedestrians in a crash, by the way the front end of the vehicle is designed. If they hit one of these pedestrian guardrails first, none of that impact protection matters, because the vehicle is now striking pedestrians with a large lump of twisted metal in the way. These barriers will not save anyone if a car is heading towards them.

Lastly, they obscure the view of people, especially children, and they are prone to having signs and banners hung on them which obscured vision even further.

I thought a further reason for getting rid of them was that cyclists (especially, but also any pedestrians on the "wrong" side) can get squashed against them by drivers who don't notice a cyclist on their left. Without the barriers, a cyclist could mount the pavement to escape or at least fall off towards the pavement, but with these, there is nowhere for them to go.

There have been several cyclists killed as a result of this. Usually by left turning HGVs.

[phil gollin]

For the simple reason that it's been found that removing them improves safety
https://www.autoexpress.co.uk/car-news/ ... ian-deaths

.

I'm fascinated by most of the responses to this subject when your link shows that the main reason safety improves when railings are removed is the BETTER BEHAVIOUR BY DRIVERS.

It would seem that drivers, even on this board, like blaming others.

.

[Bryn666]

For the simple reason that it's been found that removing them improves safety
https://www.autoexpress.co.uk/car-news/ ... ian-deaths

.

I'm fascinated by most of the responses to this subject when your link shows that the main reason safety improves when railings are removed is the BETTER BEHAVIOUR BY DRIVERS.

It would seem that drivers, even on this board, like blaming others.

.

The better behaviour comes about simply because drivers are forced to be more attentive to pedestrian activity rather than driving faster because they're penned in behind a non containment rated barrier and therefore out of the way. The railings cause the poor behaviour; much like painting central hatching encourages faster driving because drivers don't fear meeting oncoming traffic.