Traffic Safety Innovations: The Scramble

On any sunny weekend afternoon, downtown Hermosa’s streets and sidewalks become congested with visitors and residents—parents with strollers, teenagers on skateboards, packs of cyclists and pedestrians roaming Pier Plaza.

To meet high-traffic demands, local officials last year installed several traffic measures  to make the city more pedestrian- and bike-friendly. 

One measure was the installation of a pedestrian crossing system called a “” at the intersection of Hermosa and Pier avenues, which is a traffic measure that halts all vehicular traffic to allow pedestrians to cross the intersection in any direction, including diagonally.

The city installed  (a combination of the words “shared” and “arrow”), designated road-sharing lanes along Hermosa Avenue, to give bicyclists the right of way in the right lane. 

Sharrows are still being tested in the area as  and .

As these two measures, along with stop signs and other conventional traffic controls, attempt to secure traffic safety, a question looms: Are they working?

Part I: The Scramble

City officials have deemed the downtown scramble necessary to give pedestrians a safer way to cross the busy intersection at Pier and Hermosa.

"I don't know of anyone with a man-versus-car incident myself, but it's much safer—even for cyclists," City Councilman Kit Bobko told Patch in October, the month the scramble was inaugurated.

But the scramble has caused some traffic confusion, according to some locals. 

“I think the biggest thing is that there wasn’t enough knowledge made [available] to the people of Hermosa Beach, specifically to the drivers, as to how this was going to work,” said Manhattan Beach resident Brian Holm, who frequently drives on Hermosa Avenue. 

“They put up a lot of great signs saying, ‘No right turn.’ But what ended up happening is people would sit there honking their horn, saying, ‘Come on, turn,’ not realizing there was no turn, not realizing [they] did something for the pedestrians here,” Holm said.

Once pedestrians learn more about how the scramble functions, it will become easier to navigate, police Chief Greg Savelli told Patch. 

“I think it is working well,” Savelli said. “But residents and people who come to the Plaza still tend to walk on the vehicle green [signal]. When that happens, it causes problems. Pedestrians really need to pay attention to just the pedestrian signal.”

Hermosa Beach police Officer Lance McColgan was monitoring foot traffic on Pier Avenue at the scramble from a police vehicle during a crowded Sunday afternoon last week. 

He echoed the sentiment that the scramble has been difficult for residents to understand. While McColgan doesn’t speak for the Police Department, he said, “This new thing is so confusing to people... They should have kept it the old way, that’s my opinion.”

Even with the occasional confusion, many Hermosa Beach residents said that they are glad to have a dedicated signal to cross the intersection without vehicle traffic. 

“I used to almost get hit, especially on Friday or Saturday night,” said Hermosa resident Dan Brumett. “Kids are driving from out of town, and they don’t know what they’re doing.”

Brumett is a fan of the scramble, despite it causing confusion for motorists and pedestrians, he said.  

“It’s great. I think it’s a lot safer than it used to be,” he said. “Once [people] figure it out, it’s safe all around.”

Looking back on the time between October and now, Bobko said that the scramble has accomplished what it was intended for, which is to make the intersection safer for pedestrians.

“The scramble was really a safety measure, because everybody who is crossing the street is not worried about car-versus-pedestrian conflict,” Bobko said. “It used to be that…whoever was turning left or right from Pier onto Hermosa Avenue was always turning into the pedestrians who were trying to cross at the light.” 

He said that despite the confusion it has caused some residents, overall the scramble has had a positive effect.

“Some people were having a hard time with it,” Bobko said. “They didn’t like the change, but over time I think people have grown accustomed to it. … For the most part, people like it.”

In Part 2, we'll tell you why the effects on traffic of Hermosa’s sharrow lanes are more debatable, and, according to police Chief Greg Savelli, depend on one’s point of view.