Blossom Hill Road crossing of Monterey Highway and the railroad

Restore walking and bicycling facilities on this bridge in San Jose!

Akos Szoboszlay, President, Modern Transit Society.       January 15, 2006

Each of the next three photos can be clicked to go to a page with more details and photos on that topic.

    

Above photo: San Jose eliminated pedestrian facilities for more traffic. See former shoulder line on bridge and notice the new line, and that the shoulder is now TOO NARROW for pedestrians and bicyclists. [Click for "Deception-Destruction" photo series.]

    

Above photo: Capitol Expressway bridge, just two miles north, is proof that safety improvements can be made promptly at nominal-cost. [Click for "Capitol bridge" photo series.] The first safety improvement was by MTS in 1997. MTS' efforts forced County Roads to rermove their illegal "pedestrians prohibited" signs, thus allowing pedestrians to use the bike lanes on the bridge rather than force them to step across the tracks and also to cross Monterey Road at-grade. The second safety improvement was by County Roads creating the staircase shortcut in the year 2000, along with the sidewalk, to further encouraged use of the bridge. Bridges are the safest type of crossing.


Above photo: Corrections to San Jose DOT's poor roadway design, such as zebra striped shoulders, can be made promptly at low cost. More corrective options are depicted in the "Corrections" photo series.]

Click any photo to open a page of photos that illustrates the above points.

After viewing the three photo series, the following becomes clear:

Deception is used against pedestrians by San Jose's roadway design. The poor roadway design encourages pedestrians to cross the tracks by:

San Jose eliminated existing pedestrian facilities at this location, as follows:

Capitol Expressway bridge: proof that safety improvements can be made promptly at low-cost.

San Jose DOT has ignored safety warnings for years by MTS and others

Here is a quote of the 2003 letter to San Jose DOT from the Modern Transit Society:
"The alternative [to using the bridge] today is to walk across the RR tracks with no signaling or whistle blowing. A similar situation on Monterey & Capitol about two years ago resulted in a ped getting killed by a train and the County settling the lawsuit. As a result, Dan Collen [County Roads Department] put in a sidewalk on the bridge."
The letter is posted here:  http://moderntransit.org/blossomhill/blossomhill2003.pdf

Conclusions

There are two conclusions:

Links

Google aerial or street map (then click "street" or "hybrid" for street names or zoom in by clicking "+")

Stop banning bicycles and pedestrians from bridges! Stop destroying bicycle / pedestrian facilities! (This page was created long before the recent fatality). 

Katrina Hatton Case Network Web Page

Modern Transit Society home page

MTS warning to SJ DOT about the danger, in 2003: http://moderntransit.org/blossomhill/blossomhill2003.pdf
Our 2003-created web page on Blossom Hill Road bridge.

Recent: Here is our recently emailed letter to Council member Forrest Williams, which has more details:
http://moderntransit.org/blossomhill/blossomhill.text

Further information from MTS regarding this fatality: Death resulted by walking facility removed from Blossom Hill Road bridge

For a copy of the above outline: download  pdf file  or  rtf file.

Contacts:

Akos Szoboszlay, President, Modern Transit Society: 408 221 0694 (mobile).  For email, see MTS contacts page.


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