Village of Downers Grove, IL
http://www.vil.downers-grove.il.us

June 26, 2003

Mr. Ernest D.L. Huckaby MUTCD
Leader-Federal Highway Administration
Room 3408, HOTO-1
400 Seventh Street S. W.
Washington, DC 20590

Re: Experimental Request-Yellow/Green Pavement Markings

Dear Mr. Huckaby,

The purpose of this letter is to seek your guidance to support an experimental use of yellow/green pavement markings for school zone crosswalks. I was asked to send this request to your office by the 3M Chicago representative.

The Village of Downers Grove has a strong interest in improving pedestrian safety and overall visibility in our school zones. Yellow/green markings will give both pedestrians and motorists enhanced warnings while retaining all other MUTCD requirements for crosswalks. They will also compliment our high visibility fluorescent yellow/green crosswalk signs.

Our plan is to mark one of two crosswalks on one test street with significant school population usage. We will install the new crosswalk downstream from the second conventionally-striped crosswalk. This will allow us to make an adequate comparison of the test's effect to standard crosswalk markings. The Village will be monitoring pedestrian safety and the visibility improvement by examining the reduction in accidents and reduction in traffic speeds. We feel this process is the best way to test the application over different racial, economic, and cultural lines. The crash statistics at the test site will be compiled and some speed studies will be conducted to establish the necessary "before" data. A reduction in accidents and a reduction in traffic speeds will be used as the significant measures of the application's success. We will also be preparing semi-annual reports to your office as specified in the manual.

Therefore, please let us know what we need to do to gain approval for this important project. We look forward to your response and will be glad to answer any additional questions you may have. You can contact Assistant Directors of Public Works, Bob Schiller at 630-434-5463 or Mike Millette at 630-434-5494.

Very best regards,
/s/
Dorin Fera, AICP
NCUTCD Bicycle Technical Committee
Village Traffic Manager
VILLAGE OF DOWNERS GROVE, IL