Bright yellow curb extenders are here to stay in Calgary's southeast
Calgary's bright yellow concrete blocks have been so effective at slowing down traffic in one southeast neighbourhood that they're about to become a permanent fixture there.
Since 2016, the made-in-Calgary, temporary concrete curbs have been piloted in Erin Woods as a relatively cheap way for the city to narrow roads, slow traffic and make neighbourhoods safer.
Over the past two years, the pilot program has led to a 25 per cent reduction in serious injuries, as well as an improvement in drivers' yielding behaviour toward pedestrians in Erin Woods, said Jonathan Chapman, a transportation planner with the city.
"Every individual car is moving at a different speed, but when you look at it on average, we're seeing a reduction of around three kilometres per hour."
The city plans to pour concrete at eight locations later this summer to make these road changes a permanent fixture in Erin Woods.
To date, the city has deployed 730 of these temporary curbs to 90 locations across Calgary, including Winston Heights-Mountview and Beddington.
The curbs recently won the Transportation Association of Canada's 2019 Road Safety Engineering Award, which will be presented in September at their annual conference.
