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FDOT, UF partner to kick off new fall semester with pedestrian and traffic safety

Press release from Florida Department of Transportation

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — The University of Florida and the Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) are partnering during the first day of the fall semester to educate the campus community about pedestrian, scooter, and bicycle safety.

On Wednesday, Aug. 23, representatives from the university, FDOT, and University of Florida Police (UFPD) officers will be at the southwest corner of University Avenue and 13th Street, encouraging safe pedestrian and driving behaviors during peak traffic times from 11:30 a.m. until 1:30 p.m.

Officials also will bring awareness to FDOT’s ongoing safety improvements to University Avenue (State Road 26), which include the new signalization at the intersections of University Avenue at 16th Street and University Avenue at 19th Street to promote pedestrian safety and increase mobility, completed in June. In addition, there are safety enhancements underway for raised crosswalks near NW 14th Street and Gale Lemerand Drive to provide pedestrians with new places to cross University Avenue safely. This project is expected to be completed summer 2024.

UFPD will give away helmets and lights and register scooters and bicycles.

  • They better prepare themselves… they’ll probably be sharing that corner with the panhandlers.

    • I was going to say; “they need to get the panhandlers out of the medians”. It’s total BS if they don’t get the panhandlers out the medians in the 10 lanes of busy traffic on Archer Road.

      • The bums are starting to wander off the medians and into stopped traffic now. I can’t tell you how many times I have seen a police car drive right past an intersection with a bum on each median.

        Should we all just start running red lights and parking in handicap spots now, since there are apparently no laws anymore? It’s only a matter of time until an innocent person and their family is hurt colliding with one of these mentally unstable transients. Get them out of Gainesville!

        • Reminds me of the “broken window syndrome” they talk about in law enforcement: If it looks like nobody cares, things get worse. There used to be a local ordinance requiring panhandlers to have a permit, stay “x” feet away from the entrance to businesses, etc. I don’t think any of that is enforced these days. And the way the political winds are blowing, I expect some law abiding citizen will eventually be prosecuted for a confrontation which can’t be avoided. It’s been awhile since a guy assaulted me, stopping his bike directly between me and a store I was headed to after parking my car. Our city cops take direction from unstable and timid leadership on this issue, so law abiding citizens might be on their own if it comes down to such confrontations which cannot be avoided. Good luck, Gainesville!
          :-/

  • They can do ALL THE SAFETY THEY WANT ON WEST UNIVERSITY, And as long as Students Don’t put the PHONES, HEADPHONES, ETC, AWAY! There is ALWAYS GOING TO BE
    “ACCIDENTS!😳

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