Department of Transportation spokesperson Jeremy Woodrow said he is bracing for complaints following the state’s order that the Haines Borough remove scenes recently painted on two Main Street crosswalks.
“We’re ready for the calls,” Woodrow said.
Woodrow said the state learned of the painting by reading a newspaper article about artist Merrick Bochart’s work on the crosswalks. The borough spent about $1,500 on the crosswalks, including the one at Port Chilkoot Dock, which will not be removed.
The two offending crosswalks, at the intersection of Main Street and Second Avenue, are in the state’s right-of-way. Decorated crosswalks amount to a safety issue, Woodrow said.
“A marked crosswalk with a mural on it can be a distraction. It can also potentially hide the pedestrian crossing because the motorist may not see their contrast between the black road and the white marked lines,” he said.
Crosswalks are marked for “conspicuity,” so motorists and pedestrians both realize the code of conduct within that zone, Woodrow said. “It can confuse a motorist or pedestrian,” he said.
The department discussed the issue at length internally, Woodrow said, and consulted with the Federal Highway Administration and other DOT staff across the state to see if the question had arisen elsewhere. They also debated whether to allow the murals to stay in place for the remainder of the tourism season.
“We did discuss whether we should allow the borough to leave the mural up for the summer. The paint will go away one way or another,” Woodrow said. “However, because it is a safety issue, we couldn’t justify it. If an accident was caused because a pedestrian or motorist couldn’t tell it was a crosswalk, could you sleep with yourself at night? And we said we couldn’t.”
Public Works director Ralph Borders, who spearheaded the crosswalk beautification effort, said he was disappointed. “What I really thought is, ‘Do we really want a road between here and there so these people can come here and tell us what to do?’” Borders said.
Borders said he talked to local DOT foreman Matt Boron about the murals before putting them in, but never got a firm go-ahead. “I thought we had an understanding but I must have misunderstood.”
Public facilities director Brad Ryan said the borough will paint over the designs soon, likely after Fourth of July weekend.
“DOT doesn’t like the fact that we painted fish in a crosswalk,” Ryan said. “It seems like they should have bigger things to worry about. Whatever. It’s their road, so we’ll play.”
Woodrow, after learning the borough intended to paint over the crosswalks, called to say that was not “an advisable removal method,” because the images would be visible once the black paint wore away. “They will have to figure out some other way to remove them,” he said.
Borders said in a June 16 CVN story that he got the idea for the paintings from crosswalks in San Francisco’s Castro District. In reaction to the state’s decision this week, Facebook users posted photos of painted, brightly colored crosswalks in other places.
Borders said he will talk to artist Bochart about beautifying other borough-owned crosswalks in town, perhaps near the intersection of Second Avenue and Willard Street, or on Beach Road.
When she heard the news Wednesday, Bochart said the state’s decision was a “bummer.”
“It’s a little disappointing. Mostly state politics and city politics remain completely confusing to me,” she said. “It’s confusing, but if that’s what they say, then maybe that is how it has to be.”
DOT spokesperson Woodrow said crosswalks either can be marked with the two white lines or with diagonal white stripes within two white lines.
“One of the reasons it was a tough decision for the department is we don’t oppose public art at all. We find public art to be very attractive,” Woodrow said.
“We understand it may seem like a trivial matter, but as a state we are trying to work toward zero highway fatalities. We already have 31 this year,” he added. “Anything we can do to prevent any other highway or road fatality, we are going to do the best we can.”