San Francisco’s first-ever raised intersection is coming to Page Street

An important step toward safer streets

Today, at a San Francisco Municipal Transportation Authority (SFMTA) hearing, we celebrated a milestone victory for pedestrians!

The City approved and will build the first-ever raised intersection at Page and Buchanan.

A raised intersection is a design tool that transforms the whole intersection into a place that puts pedestrians first. It increases the visibility of people on foot, and gets cars and bikes to slow down through the whole intersection.

This is exactly the kind of street design that San Francisco needs more of, to achieve the city’s Vision Zero goal of eliminating all traffic deaths and severe injuries by 2024.

Walk San Francisco proposed the idea of a raised intersection early on in the planning process for the Page Street Neighborway project, and advocated strongly for it throughout. (See our May post about it.) Until today, it was unclear whether the raised intersection would remain in the final plans. Now it will officially be built in 2019. We are thrilled, and can’t wait for people to experience this type of top-notch pedestrian infrastructure firsthand!

The Page Street Neighborway project also includes other pedestrian safety improvements, like bulb-outs, also known as corner extensions (see the 1’s in the picture above). These reduce the distance and time needed to cross the street, increase visibility between drivers and people walking, and slow down cars that are turning. There will be ADA accessibility upgrades along Page Street, too. Read more about the project.

Many thanks to the neighborhood residents and community partners who spoke out for a truly pedestrian-friendly Page Street.

Note: Page Street will be coming back to the SFMTA Board for approval of another part of the project: a traffic diverter to help calm the street even more by moving some vehicle traffic off of Page. We will keep you posted on this decision.