Forgotten Fan Steve Fallon has discovered an isolated flock of DONT WALK/WALK signs, apparently the last of their species, in an isolated corner of the Bronx. These may be the only ones still remaining in New York City; all others were replaced beginning in 1999 by signals I call the Hand (red) and the Man (green).
There’s also a burgeoning idea to also post “countdown” lights that would enable pedestrians to see how much time they have to cross the street before they’re steamrollered. These lights are already in use in Boston and DC.
WALK/DONT WALK signs first appeared in the late 1950s, along with the large, guy-wired stoplights they were most often attached to, on busier NYC streetcorners. And so they remained, for over four decades, until the DOT converted the signs to pictograms so that non-English speakers could read them. The DOT never inserted an apostrophe, by the way.
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Unfortunately, looks like these are all gone now :(.
A few years ago I could have sworn I spotted a walk/don’t walk from the Airtrain in Queens one evening while heading to JFK. I still have to check that out.
No, there are no remaining Walk/Don’t Walk signals in Queens. I went to JFK one day and checked.
By the way, the 4 photos above are not the photos of the intersection. Only the cover photo is the photo of a signal at the intersection.
My source must have been incorrect
They’re gone now, but the signs were where I said they were. There was a lot of construction on both sides of the bridge there and most the signs were on the eastern side, with one I believe, the main pic, on the western side.
I should add, if I remember correctly, it was the Dewey/Tremont Ave/295 intersection, and the other were also right there, may have been the Dewey/Edison, it doesn’t really matter as that’s where they were. But again, they’ve been gone for a while now so it’s history.
Believe it or not, there was one signalized intersection in particular that seemed to be forgotten by D.O.T. It is located in the Bronx, and it is E. 153rd Street and the service road that connects to the Major Deegan Expressway. The last time that I visited this (which was in late 2006 or so), everything was incandescent, which was quite a surprise to me, not to mention the traffic signals themselves. Sadly, though, this intersection was upgraded in recent years, and everything is now L.E.D.
On Google Map, one was once able to see this set-up prior to the alteration, but the pictures were updated recently.
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