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Pedestrian Safety

dane county traffic safety

SUPPORTING ARTISTS AND SAFETY

artful crossings initiative

According to observational studies conducted in Dane County communities, only about 6% of motorists yield to pedestrians, even though Wisconsin state law requires it.

To increase safety we launched a pedestrian flag program in 2003, and saw yield to pedestrian rates go up to nearly 90% at targeted intersections. There are 50 pedestrian flag crossings throughout Dane County thanks to adopting organizations. To keep costs to a minimum, the sites were installed with PVC pipes used as makeshift flag holders, which are unsightly and can be easily damaged.

Fast forward 13 years since the program began, and a “beautiful” opportunity now exists thanks to a new partnership with area artists, Sector67Hackerspace and Madison Traffic Engineering Department. Through Artful Crossings, our current ‘ugly duckling’ holders will be retired and replaced with street art featuring local artists on newly tooled boxes.

adopt a flag site

Like so many communities, we have wonderful, creative artists whose work is unknown to many right here at home. We’re so excited to be able to showcase our artists in public places throughout the city. Thanks to in-kind contributions of time by Madison Traffic Engineering to install the holders in the public right of way and volunteer time provided by the fabricator of our boxes, Mike Fisher from Sector67.

Neighborhoods, business districts, police departments, and others can “adopt” these sites with support from Safe Communities. Click the ‘Pedestrian Flag Site Application’ button or the ‘Artist Submission’ button to the right for more information.

Are you interested in helping maintain the Artful Crossings Stations?

SAFE CROSSING

safety goes both ways

ARTFUL CROSSING IN THE NEWS

The Artful Crossings Initiative has been applauded by many for its creative and clever take on pedestrain safety.

“Artful Crossings is a project of Safe Communities Madison-Dane County, a nonprofit dedicated to public safety, in collaboration with the city’s Traffic Engineering Division. It builds on Safe Communities’ pedestrian flag program, launched in 2002. Three installations are complete, three more are under way, and ten will hopefully be done by next summer”

- Jay Rath, Isthmus News

RESOURCES

related news

Person driving in a car

Traffic Crashes Down, Fatalities Up in 2022

For Immediate Release For more information, contact: Cheryl Wittke, Executive Director, Safe Communities of Madison – Dane County,  (608) 256-6713 Traffic Crashes Down, Fatalities Up in 2022  Forty-four persons lost

Read More

RECOVERY IS POSSIBLE

Treatment Key

Safe communities has complied a list of abbreviation definitions for finding the right treatment for you.

MAT: Medication for Addiction Treatment.
OP: Outpatient Treatment – person lives at home or in the community, attends. individual and group therapy, these can include or not include MAT.
IOP: Intensive Outpatient Treatment – person lives at home or in the community, attends individual and extended groups, 9-12 hours a week.
Residential: person lives at the facility for a period of at least 14 days, some last as many as 45 days.
PHP: Partial Hospitalization Program is a structured mental health treatment program that runs for several hours each day, three to five days per week.
DBT: Dialectical behavior therapy is a form of cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) that integrates mindfulness techniques.