Posted by Vince Wadhwani on Apr 10, 2006

In November there were two problems that were really bothering me. In the suburbs there was a stretch of sidewalk near the metro that the city kept plowing snow onto. And in the city there was a pedestrian walk signal that was not working correctly. I set out to tackle both problems. One with a small time municipal government and the other with beaurocracy of the nations capital. My success was mixed but not in the way you might expect.

First the suburbs: While I understand the need to keep the streets clean of snow, I do not appreciate it happening at the expense of pedestrians. For weeks I had to walk through six to eight inches of trecherous snow while giant SUV's went speeding by me on the streets. My choice was clear: either accept the extra 20 minutes to get to work or risk getting hit by a car.

I decided that the city probably did not know it was inconveniencing pedestrians and, given all the press about wanting to make the suburbs more pedestrian friendly, that they would gladly clear the sidewalk once they were made aware of the problem. WRONG! After over a dozen phone calls and several emails (with pictures) to various agencies the closest I could get was that it was the responsibility of the store owner or resident where the sidewalk was located. This, despite me telling them that there is no store owner or resident in front of this sidewalk!

For better or for worse, the snow melted early. And with its departure any complaints I could make would be impossible to address. I fear that there is no end in sight here and that others after me are destined to be treated as second class citizens until they get in a car. Sadly, such is suburban life these days.

As mentioned, the second thing I tackled around that same time was a pedestrian signal in city proper. Not just any pedestrian signal, but one near a busy intersection near my house. I first noticed it was faulty back in June 2005 but was complacent about reporting it. I figured somebody else would take care of it.. By November it had still not been fixed and I started to take action.

The problem with the signal isn't that it doesn't operate at all. No, that would be easy to spot and to fix. The problem is that it goes from "Walk" to a solid "Don't Walk" to a blinking "Don't Walk" and then back to a solid "Don't Walk." That's the equivalent of a traffic signal going from green to red to yellow and then back to red. The effect being that people either wait when they don't have to risk getting hit by a car because they don't know whether the signal is 'red about to turn yellow' or 'red and staying red'.

Much like my above experience with the snow removal, I started making a few phone calls. People seemed friendly enough at first. The mayor even has a hotline for this sort of thing. I got a ticket number and assurance that it would be fixed next week. Well, next week came and nothing happened. And so on and so on I called and I called until one time somebody informed me that the Mayor's office didn't actually do this sort of thing and that it was the responsibilities of the DDOT. To make a long story short, the DDOT were not helpful either.

Until one fateful day when I saw one of their employees riding a bike down the street. I flagged him down and spoke with him about my plight. Although DDOT is rather big, he did take the time to call me with the contact name for the right person to speak with. It took one month, two phone calls, and an almost-phone-call to the Washington Post but today, after almost a year, that stupid pedestrian walk signal works the way it should. I feel so proud.

Lessons learned? 1) The Suburbs are NOT more efficient than the city. 2) You don't need to do big things to change the world for the better. 3) Sometimes you just gotta be persistent.