This fence is built across Waldron Avenue, splitting the block in two. A similar fence exists one block over on Beverly Avenue, and a simple chain blocks traffic on Victory Boulevard from turning onto East Cheshire Place. This map shows the layout of the barriers.
One neighbor who was out in his lawn told me the roadblocks have been here as long as he can remember. He said they were a response to heavy volumes of cut-through traffic. They seem like overkill though. Why do the two fences need to prevent pedestrians from passing though? It's hard to imagine the DOT approving pedestrian barriers in an attempt to keep cars from cutting though an area.
Also, as you can see in the map linked above, the roadblocks kind of just shift the problem from one street to another. They prevent traffic from cutting through on East Cheshire Place, but they allow it on Melrose Avenue. So all the drivers trying to avoid the major intersection of Victory Boulevard and Clove Road can still cut through the area, just on a different street. The barriers are effectively sacrificing one street for another.
So how does something like this that needlessly obstructs pedestrian traffic on public streets and favors one street over another get built? Perhaps the answer lies in something else the guy out in his lawn told me: that some "important people" used to live here.
Day 1019
Right across the middle of the block!
October 14th, 2014
Maybe they didn’t want speed bumps? Now we have to wonder what the residents think. Is this the good side or is that the good side?
I walk through that area via Cheshire and East Cheshire Place (East Cheshire has the chain across, blocking if off from Victory Blvd). I have never noticed rampant speeding on Cheshire or Waldron Avenue, and believe me I’m always looking for examples of speeding. In fact I take that route because the area is calmer.
When a driver uses Cheshire and Waldron to avoid the traffic signal at Victory Blvd and Clove Road, they still have traffic signals at Cheshire and Clove and again at Waldron and Victory. It doesn’t save much time taking that shortcut. The shortcut also represents a one block stretch, a 90 degree turn, and then a short one block stretch, with a stop sign for the north and westbound Waldron to Cheshire drivers. I’m willing to bet that if they took down the chain at East Cheshire and Victory, making the Cheshire stretch a long two block stretch with a somewhat less than 90 degree turn at East Cheshire, without a stop sign for the north and westbound drivers, you’d see a lot more speeding on Cheshire and East Cheshire. A look at a map will show what I’m talking about. (Give a Staten Island driver a three block stretch without a stop sign or traffic signal and you’ve got speeding/ They don’t care if it’s a residential area or a school zone or whatever).
There is also a steep hill (Highland Avenue) leading to East Cheshire, northbound across Victory Blvd. Drivers going down that hill at speed and hitting East Cheshire straight on would likely lead to a speeding problem on East Cheshire if the chain was removed. The turn at the bottom of that hill seems to serve as a traffic calming device.
Maybe more Staten Island neighborhoods need impromptu, unsanctioned barricades.
PS…I would like to say that if people are going to block streets, they should at least make a gate for pedestrians and cyclists.
[…] Staten Islanders Wanted a Dead End Street, So They Built Their Own Barricade (I’m Just Walkin’) […]
Because there is no pedestrian traffic in Staten Island?
Sooner or later somebody behind these barriers will need an ambulance or fire truck. Does 911 know about this new street layout?