SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (KELO) – Downtown Sioux Falls (DTSF) is attempting to make the streets safer and more walkable by painting bright green bump outs this week.
DTSF received $15,000 from a nationwide AARP community challenge grant to temporarily paint bump outs on 11 intersections downtown.
“We’re just making sure that cars and people can kind of coexist downtown,” DTSF Vice President Brandon Hanson said.
The 11 intersections include three on 10th Street, three on 11th Street, two on 8th Street near Cherapa Place and one on 12th and 2nd near the post office. Within the next few days, intersections at 7th and Phillips and 9th and Phillips will get painted.
The main goal for the temporary bump-outs is to reduce speeds and hopefully make walking downtown safer. Hanson said the pilot project will last until the first snowfall and if it’s successful in slowing down traffic, permanent bump-outs will be installed in the future.
“This is more of a visual, psychological cue to slow down than just the speed limit sign,” he said. “It also just makes it very clear where the bright green is, very clear wherever there might be a person so you just kind of naturally slow down.”
Abril Johnson often walks her dog downtown. She said the streets aren’t too bad, but does acknowledge that people are driving faster than the speed limit.
“Downtown is a busy place so I think they could put something here,” she said.
About 4,000 people live downtown, Hanson said, and most of them don’t have vehicles and find themselves walking most places. The average speed on the downtown streets is 28 mph, despite the 20 mph signs.
Hanson said very little of the $15,000 was spent on paint for the 11 intersections and most of the money will go toward delineators, or small orange cones that help direct traffic.
“Over the next two days, you’ll see some more artistic ones installed, much larger Yeah. To kind of, again, visually cue the cars to that area and let people walk in there.”
A similar project with the temporary bump-outs was done a few years ago on 8th street and now, there is a permanent bump out with a crosswalk, delineators in the road and other visible signs for drivers to slow down.
“Usually, like when I see a crosswalk that’s painted, I know that indicates it’s safer to cross here than other spots,” Johnson said.
The bump-out pilot project is part of DTSF’s Lively and Beautiful Streets (LABS) initiative, which aims to improve infrastructure and pedestrian foot traffic in the neighborhood.
“It benefits everybody, it benefits the person in the car who doesn’t hit somebody,” Hanson said. “It also benefits the store owner in the retail environment downtown because people stay a little longer, it’s easier to go out to a restaurant where the patios are a little nicer.”
Also part of the LABS initiative are signs telling people to dismount their bikes and skateboards on downtown streets.
“It’s creating a better patio environment for restaurant goers where you’re not having a bike whizzing by maybe taking out at a server or something,” Hanson said. “They’d go out about the exact same time as these painted bumpouts.”
