Westgate pedestrian crossing corrected, ignored
The Westgate pedestrian crossing is functional — but how safe are pedestrians?
As promised the Record did check up on the Johannesburg Roads Agency (JRA) claims that the Westgate pedestrian crossing on Ontdekkers Road will be fully functional by Friday 2 August.
When the Record stopped by at the pedestrian crossing on the afternoon of Monday 5 August, the crossing’s new traffic lights were fully functional. The odd fencing that was put up around the crossing was taken down and men could be seen repairing the one advertisement board that Westgate Shopping Centre had complained about.
The question remains – how safe is it for a pedestrian to cross a busy road where vehicles mostly travel at 80 kilometres per hour? One would think that the traffic lights would advocate proper road etiquette.
During the Record’s brief it seemed that pedestrians were unaware of the buttons on the traffic lights that would enable them to stop the traffic so that they could cross the road. While the Record was taking photographs of the newly functional crossing, a number of vehicles sped through while the traffic lights were red. On a few occasions pedestrians were crossing the road despite the traffic lights not being in their favour.
In the brief time spent there, several taxis still halted on the sides of Ontdekkers Road and some were parked there, obscuring both pedestrians’ and motorists’ views of one another.
The Record is still waiting on JRA’s Ntsikelelo Ngubani’s response on the matter. Ngubani initially informed the Record of the procedures surrounding the setup of the pedestrian crossing.
