Stroads

What the fuck is a stroad? According to Wikipedia (yes I am lazy), A stroad is a type of thoroughfare that is a mix between a street and a road.The word stroad is a portmanteau of street and road, coined by American civil engineer and urban planner Charles Marohn in 2011, as a commentary about paved traffic structures in the United States.

Why do I bring this up? Well because I am seeing how prevalent the problem is. Yes even in Cleveland. According to Marohn, a stroad is a bad combination of two types of vehicular pathways: it is part street—which he describes as a "complex environment where life in the city happens", with pedestrians, cars, buildings close to the sidewalk for easy accessibility, with many (property) entrances / exits to and from the street, and with spaces for temporary parking and delivery vehicles—and part road, which he describes as a "high-speed connection between two places" with wide lanes and limited entrances and exits, and which are generally straight or have gentle curves. In essence, Marohn defines a stroad as a high-speed road with many turnoffs which lacks safety features. In the commentary, Marohn states that stroads do not function well as either a street or a road. According to Marohn, the problem with stroads is that engineering codes tend to emphasize speed and traffic flow rather than safety, so that stroads try to be "all things to all people" but end up failing in every way as a result.

Now this might be the first time you might have heard this which is not surprising. I only heard of this concept whilst being in the suburbs which is its own brand of hell. I want you to think about a main road you drive down. how congested is it traffic wise? For me when I’m in Lafayette (which is rare now) I think of Kaliste Saloom, Johnston, Ambassador, and Bertrand. I could go on but I’ll be here all night. Those hometown residents are keenly aware that in order to get literally anywhere you have to go down these roads. And they are pretty much always littered with cars. Why is that? Can’t anything be done about it?” you might ask. Well I have an answer for you. Those are stroads. Think about the surrounding environment of these, and you’ll notice that one they emphasize flow of traffic (ironically) and two they are hilariously set to a speed limit no one follows. These are wide laned eye sores with at least 4 lanes and are vital to get anywhere. And don’t get me started on the hilariously awful transit system. Anyways, for a Cleveland example, Chester Ave and Edgewater road (hahahaha) are also incredibly awful. While thankfully I can avoid both of these mostly, the times I can’t are just as bad as being back home. These are 6 lanes of pigs waiting to catch you speeding (no I’m not going to apologize for my language fuck off). But that’s not the only reason why they’re awful.

Stroads often do not take into account how human psychology usually determines the speed at which people drive based on the road conditions they observe. Stroads in North America typically have designated speeds between 30 and 45 miles per hour, but in practice, motorists usually drive 20 to 55 miles per hour on stroads. Simply reducing the posted speed limit (PSL) with a traffic sign, which is a widely adopted strategy attempting to prevent motorists from driving dangerously fast, may not work in practice "if the road conditions suggest that the PSL is too low, drivers may simply ignore it." A better strategy to make people comply with the legal speed limit is to design roads and streets in a way that they are 'self-explanatory'. Self-explaining roads and streets use physical and perceptual cues (also referred to as traffic calming), which lead people to automatically drive more slowly and cautiously wherever they perceive that to be necessary for their own safety, as well as that of others, especially more vulnerable road users such as pedestrians and cyclists. Such cues include "narrower lanes, tighter corner radii, gateway treatments, changed roadway surface materials and appearance, mini roundabouts and other speed management techniques" such as speed bumps. The typical lack of these cues on stroads causes motorists to drive much faster than is safe to do in the environment they are in, with many entries and exits creating points of conflict and potential collisions, especially at higher speeds. Ask yourself this, how many times have you gone over the speed limit down these abominations? No no, go on. Really because I know I have and so do many of you. If you have a wide lanes with little obstacles and the speed limit is 35mph, how fast do you go? 40? 45? 50? My point here is that driving is a subconscious action. It’s why everyone speeds on highways because wide open lanes give the impression I can go fast even if the speed limit is 55/60.

My last point of stroads is that they are fucking awful for pedestrians. Go back to Johnston St. How many times have you heard of a cyclist or a pedestrian getting hit? Too many. And also they are not accidents, they are collisions or vehicular manslaughter. Anyways, are there sidewalks on Johnston St? No of course not. Because cars rule, pedestrians drool (insert sarcastic overtones). Even if there is a sidewalk, it often times just stops for no reason and is of poor maintenance. Speaking of maintenance, what happens when the stroad reaches its life cycle? It needs to be repaired right? One problem, stroads don’t provide income. Wow really phoning it in eh? For perspective, why do many businesses on Johnston St go out of business? Sure quality of product maybe, but I guarantee that trying to navigate in and out of those businesses is a pain in the ass. In conclusion, stroads are a cancer that need to be eradicated and only produce more car traffic thus producing more fossil fuel emissions. So the next time you’re stuck behind a legion of cars, think about this and talk to your city council about why they’re fucking stupid and can’t design actual roads and streets.