QUEEN STREET TRAFFIC.

Auckland Star, Volume LXX, Issue 191, 15 August 1939, Page 8

QUEEN STREET TRAFFIC.

Traffic problems in Queen Street have been tentatively attacked on a number of occasions, but no one will centend that even a partial solution has been reached. The safety zones have done much, the pedestrian crossings would do much more if something more than r>o per cent of the people crossing the street used them, but the low .speed at which motorists necessarily pass the zones, combined with frequent stops by both cars and trains fit the intervening lattice-work crossings, together niiike wheeled traffic such a stop-and-go business that congestion is doubled. The suggestion that the Transport Board and the City Council should together rearrange the zones and pedestrian crossings by placing both at the same points and thus eliminating some of the present stoppages is certainly a promising step in the evolution of an orderly traffic, one that should assist'to increase both speed and safety in the city's main artery. That is, of course, if the people can be educated into the habitual use of the crossings. To-day, in spite of spasmodic efforts to keep them between the white lines, the pedestrians use the rules of the famous, or notorious, Mr. Rafferty and cross where and how they will, adding another complication to the problem of the motorist and still further increasing congestion by slowing down the average pace. It is to be hoped that if the evidence favours the new proposal opportunity will be taken of the change thoroughly to impress on those using the street exactly where the crossings are situated and also the perils of jay-walking to life and limb, and perhaps also to the pocket. The experiment of a loud-speaker . equipped car was successful as far as it I went, but it did not appear for a long enough period to instil habits. 1