Australia
Functioning of pedestrian signals
Pedestrian signals
- Red and green man signals with the red man flashing during flashing DONT WALK interval
- All pedestrian pushbuttons were located in very standardized locations, on the side of the crosswalk away from the parallel street, aligned with the crosswalk line, about 0.5 to 1.0 m from the curb line. Most fixed timed intersections in downtown Sydney had pushbuttons with audible and vibrotactile features.
Pedestrian signal timing
- WALK and flashing DONT WALK were similar to the US system, with clearance interval timed at 1 meter per second.
Intersection Geometry
Figure 10-6. Signalized left turn lane with APS mounted close to the crosswalk locations. Three APS are on the splitter island, one for each crossing.
Streets can be wide and complex, sometimes having narrow medians and channelized turn lanes, which were signalized in some locations.
Roundabouts are used extensively and orientation and mobility specialists and blind travelers state that roundabouts are a barrier to travel.
Detectable warnings or "TWSI's" (tactile walking indicators) are used to define the edge of the street on the curb ramp, but not consistently installed from state to state. The edge of the TWSI is intended to be aligned perpendicularly to the crosswalk direction; this is intended to provide additional directional information to blind pedestrians.
Number of APS
Each state is responsible for its own area.
Overall number was not available.
APS have been fairly extensively installed in areas where there is pedestrian traffic since the 1980s.
APS functioning
Figure 10-7. This APS has a tactile arrow within a larger visible arrow. A raised bar on the tactile arrow indicates that this is an APS. Other features include a locator tone and audible and vibrotactile WALK indication.
Pushbutton integrated type of signal is used. The pushbutton and sound are standardized nationally.
There are several APS manufacturers in the Australian market but the pole mounted control box overhead was the only visible difference. All pushbuttons looked identical, whether they had APS or not, except that those with APS features had an additional raised bar on the arrow to indicate that they had APS. All pushbuttons with audio-tactile features functioned identically.
Locator tone
Locator tone has a repetition rate of once every 2 seconds.
WALK indicator:
- Fast repetition of low frequency thumping sound during the WALK interval.
- May have the capability to be set so that the WALK sound is limited to 8 seconds even when the WALK indication is longer.
Alert tone: "Alert tone" at the beginning of the WALK indication is set to sound at 14 db above ambient.
- All devices respond to ambient sound, both for the locator tone and the WALK indication.
- Vibrotactile information at the arrow panel pulses at the same rate as the audible tone.
- Placement has been standardized at line of the crosswalk away from the center of the intersection. Orientation of face of the APS varied; see photo 4-9. Speaker for the APS is the face of the arrow so sound is emanating from face of unit. Orientation of the device can make a difference in hearing the APS when approaching or from the street.
Additional information
- All devices respond to ambient sound, both for the locator tone and the WALK indication.
- Vibrotactile information at the arrow panel pulses at the same rate as the audible tone.
- Placement has been standardized at line of the crosswalk away from the center of the intersection. Orientation of face of the APS varied; see photo 4-9. Speaker for the APS is the face of the arrow so sound is emanating from face of unit. Orientation of the device can make a difference in hearing the APS when approaching or from the street.
- APS are sometimes turned off at night due to neighbors' complaints about noise.
Comments
Figure 10-8. Typical APS location in relation to the crosswalk and sidewalk. Australian curb ramp standards allow a steeper slope than allowed by US standards.
Figure 10-9. Installation of tactile arrows was not consistent and provided misleading information in some cases
The standard location of the pushbutton, with each pushbutton located beside the waiting location for the crossing, provided a clear indication of which crossing the APS was indicating. There was no need for different sounds for different directions of travel. Even on pork chop type islands with three devices sounding, it was possible to distinguish the location and crossing being signaled.
Sources of information
George Carnazolla, Transport SA, Adelaide
Gayle Clark, Orientation and Mobility Specialist, Guide Dogs Association of SA and NT, Inc., Adelaide
Susan Lockhart, Orientation and Mobility Specialist, Sydney
Murray Mountain, Access Design Solutions, Melbourne
Bob and Jelena Panich, Bob Panich Consultancy, Ryde (Sydney)
Stephen Purtill, Specifications and Standards, VIC Roads, Melbourne
John Samperi, Signal Engineer
Roley Stuart, Client Services Manager, Guide Dogs Association of SA and NT, Inc., Adelaide
Jack Vankuyk, Traffic Signals Supervisor, RTA Operations, Sydney
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