I’ve been noticing a lot of bumps in the road in Gilroy
– cords stretched across the streets going to a pole.
Bumpy road
I’ve been noticing a lot of bumps in the road in Gilroy – cords stretched across the streets going to a pole. At first I noticed them out in between fields on Marcella Avenue and thought they were hoses stretched from field to field when i drove over them. Then i noticed them on some streets in town and realized they couldn’t be. I saw one of the boxes the cords were going to and it said ‘metro counter’. What’s the deal?
Red Phone:
Dear Counter Clues,
Red Phone drove the question to Don Dey, Gilroy’s traffic engineer and found out you’ve been driving over these cords all over Gilroy’s arterial and collector roads as part of the “Annual Traffic Flow Map.” The city does this each spring to monitor traffic flow in all parts of the city. It takes the measure to identify changes in traffic patterns to make plans for improvement. The cords monitor traffic patterns on a typical day – a Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday in April or May. There are 10 count stations that count traffic for 24 hours at a time. Then the cords are moved to a different location.
Dey said there are about 200 locations in Gilroy that are being monitored, and the process should be finished up by the end of the first week of June. He explained that the numbers are analyzed on a macro level – it’s more the five-year patterns the city pays attention to rather than the year-to-year numbers.
What’s the cylce cylce?
I had trouble Thursday on my bicylce when I needed to make a left hand turn. I wanted to do the correct thing and flow with traffic, but i didn’t get a signal to turn at the traffic light. What am I supposed to do to get a signal?
Red Phone:
Dear bicyclist,
According to Dey, your bicycle won’t be recognized unless it’s over the traffic loop, which he explains as a wire in the pavement that senses when metal crosses over it to recognize a vehicle in that traffic signal rotation. Detecting your bike depends on a few things such as the amount of metal, the tuning of the loop, and how recently the road has been paved or coated. Cars don’t have any difficulty being recognized because they are so heavy. Bikers on the other hand should look for the traffic loop, which is generally visible, and make sure you are over it. If the configuration of the loop isn’t modern or properly tuned, you won’t get a signal. Dey advises bikers in your situation to No. 1, do what is safe at that intersection; No. 2, do what is legal and No. 3, notify the city of specific locations where you’ve identified a problem so city staff can check into it. The number to call is 846.0451.
