Mr. Write's Page

Ah, where to begin?

Athens, Georgia, like many cities, has a central business district, which is surrounded by a mixed commercial and residential zone, which is ringed by a perimeter highway, which is encircled by suburbs.

Highways come into Athens from all directions, like spokes on a wheel, leading toward the downtown area. One of those spokes on the north side is Prince Avenue.

Prince Avenue is about two miles long, stretching from the perimeter highway to downtown. It’s very eclectic, lined with everything from restaurants and stores to professional offices and stately old mansions. It is a heavily-traveled thoroughfare with numerous cross streets and a boatload of traffic signals.

You would expect Prince to be painfully slow to navigate, but it isn’t. Backups are not common. Somehow, despite heavy traffic, all those traffic lights, and a speed limit of 35, the traffic flows surprisingly well.

Prince Avenue is, in fact, a bit of a racetrack. Way too many people drive way too fast.

The closer you get to downtown, the worse the problem becomes. In the last few blocks, the lanes narrow. More pedestrians are out and about. Yet, cars are zipping along at 40 mph when the conditions call for 20.

Bear with me on this. I need to set the stage properly.

For years, the city fathers have anguished about the situation and conducted traffic studies. No real solutions have emerged.

A while back, after much lobbying by merchants and residents, the city built two mid-block crosswalks on Prince where pedestrian traffic is especially high.

One crosswalk is in front of Daily Groceries Co-Op, a popular organic grocery store. The other is two blocks away in front of The Grit, a vegetarian restaurant. Both are very busy places.

But the crosswalks were a bust. Most drivers, accustomed to stopping for red lights and nothing else, were oblivious to a few more yellow signs and some white stripes in the road.

Bikers and pedestrians entering the crosswalks had to guess whether or not the approaching drivers would see them and stop, as the law requires.

But Athens was persistent. The city added flashing lights at the two crosswalks. When you push a button, it triggers a frenetic light show, aimed squarely at oncoming traffic. Surely, that would get the attention of even the most oblivious drivers.

The flashing lights helped, but only to a limited degree. The core problem, speeding drivers and close calls, remained.

As 2015 began, the city fathers decided to try again. On January 7, Athens began a six-month pilot program at the crosswalks that they hope will do the trick.

Under the program, the city placed a supply of orange flags at the crosswalks. Pedestrians are supposed to take a flag and wave it vigorously while in the crosswalk.

The instructions from the city:

— Activate the flashing beacons by pushing the crosswalk button.
— Remove one flag from the holder — only one flag per group is necessary.
— Hold the flag to make the flag visible to drivers on your left.
— When traffic on your left has stopped, proceed with caution in the crosswalk.
— As you approach the center of the road, make the flag visible to drivers on your right.
— Make sure all lanes of traffic have stopped before completing the crossing of Prince
Avenue.
— Return the flag to the holder for others to use.

A proper bureaucratic reaction.

The first day of the flag program was both inauspicious and ironic, as reported online by an employee at Daily Groceries:

“We at Daily watched this morning as the County employee, wearing a bright yellow safety vest and holding several flags, walked through the crosswalk to place flags on the other side of the street.

“As he crossed, the traffic (as usual) nearly ran him down — one car drove through the crosswalk directly in front of him while he was in it (which again, is typical). “

To appreciate this tale fully, you need to know that directly across Prince Avenue from The Grit is the office of Flagpole Magazine.

Flagpole is the Village Voice/Rolling Stone/Mother Jones of Athens, providing coverage of the local social/political/college/music scene.

A proudly liberal publication, Flagpole describes itself as for “movers and shakers and the moved and shaken.”

Flagpole is, of course, at the forefront in reporting news about the crosswalks and the ongoing perils of Prince Avenue. And it has gleefully mocked the orange flags.

The editor of Flagpole wrote, “Wave a white flag and surrender to the cars. Wave a checkered flag and let the drivers know to start their engines. Wave a Confederate flag if you want Boulevard to secede from Athens. (Actually, that last one’s not so cool. Don’t do that.)”

(Note: “Boulevard” refers to the Boulevard Historic District, a nearby neighborhood that is fighting to hold back feverish development and maintain its identity. It’s on the National Register of Historic Places.)

The editor also wrote, “Athens-Clarke County installed the orange flags at two Prince Avenue crosswalks Wednesday morning, and by Thursday afternoon — I’m surprised it took this long — people were already replacing them with their own, more creative banners.”

What happened next was inevitable. Flagpole announced a “Prince Avenue fly-your-own-flag contest,” inviting readers to submit photos lampooning the use of the orange flags.

The winner could come to the office and pick up a $25 gift certificate to The Grit, although “Flagpole assumes no liability for you being run over getting there.”

When I learned about the contest, it seemed like a no-brainer. The perfect entry would be a photo based on the cover of the 1969 Beatles album “Abbey Road.”

But I have an indolent streak. I was too lazy to stage a shot. Or Photoshop one.

No worries. Someone else was up to the task. Athens photographer Matt Hardy staged the photo with the help of ladies from the Secret City burlesque troupe.

Note that the ladies are wearing orange flags.

But that shot wasn’t the winner of the contest. The winning entry, also from Matt and the ladies, was this one.

As Flagpole reported, the photo shoot that day literally stopped traffic.

Athens, I love ya.