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Some sensible cost cutting, good bye and good riddance to half of the TMA

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It sucks that people will be losing their jobs, but a lot of the TMA's work that I've seen has been complete waste.  What exactly was the point of having someone standing in the middle of a traffic-light-controlled intersection in downtown, Wrigleyville, etc other than putting someone's life in completely unnecessary danger?

TMA's are to all traffic participants like stop signs are to bicyclists: Following their direction is optional.

 

I may be wrong, but it appears that TMA's lacked the stature of a police officer. That is why everyone ignored them.

 

It didn't help that they often appeared at random, and if there was more than one of them in an intersection, their actions appeared uncoordinated: One was waving cars through the intersection one one side, while the other was waving pedestrians trough.

This is great news, thanks for posting.

I've been hearing insider stories about some of the other cuts going on in city government, some of them kind of bizarre.

Rahm seems to be serious about trimming dead wood, and quickly.

As far as I can tell, they just slowed traffic even more.  People didn't know what to do and it was often hard to dodge them in the middle of the road.

From my perspective, they just appeared in droves from one day to the next with little apparent training and an hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of uniforms (more?). Initially they seemed to completely prioritize cars and treat pedestrians like they didn't exist, but that seemed to get better after the first year or so.  In any event, the goal was always to try to keep automobiles moving as quickly as possible, which IMO is detrimental to our city in the long run (well, in the short run too!).

Buh-bye.

Ever see any other crowed intersection during rush hour?  I work in Albany Park, and Foster and Kedzie is a terrible intersection to be in between 4-5pm or so.  As many cars as possible squeeze themselves in up until the last second, and at least one car is always sticking out so the perpendicular traffic can't go when their light turns green.  Much of the traffic takes up the rush hour-empty parking lane on the right, only to have to merge up front later (because someone IS parked on the right during the no-parking time) and merging seems to take more time than just waiting single file behind the other cars.  I've never cycled downtown during rush hour, so I haven't really experienced TMAs all that much.  Although, I'd imagine downtown traffic might be more unruly than that in Albany Park.  I'd like to hear about how it goes after those TMAs have been gone for a while.  I also wish cars didn't take up so much space.
Keep the cuts coming Rham!
I hate to see people lose their jobs as well, but honestly, I can't say this is a bad move. Special events and construction will still see coverage, and I'm tired of seeing traffic aides at intersections that have working stoplights.
sorry to be the contrarian but if you ride a bike then, yes, they are pointless. If you've ever watched them yell at drivers you'd have to agree that they provide a necessary service. Its pretty apparent that drivers need a little guidance during high volume hours especially because this city has a reluctance to include green arrows for left turning vehicles. And they prioritize cars because getting the cars moving in and through the city is the priority. If Rahm really want to do something regarding transportation in this city, a simple dedicated bus lane would do wonders for getting people out of their cars.

Dedicated bus lanes are planned on 4 corridors.

In the meantime, I don't see the point of helping facilitate the flow of automobile traffic.

Considering it took years for city govt to figure out how "bus bunching" occurred, I have little faith in seeing these dedicated bus lanes coming to be. Plus, they seem to want to utilize existing parking restrictions so these are rush hour-only lanes that will likely just get ignored. I hope I'm wrong, but I fear I'm not. I gladly go car-free but this is a city and that means numerous modes of transportation and that, like it or not, includes automobiles. Encouraging gridlock won't discourage car use, elimination of parking probably would, but not traffic jams. I think the city actually encourages traffic jams without designating turn lanes, actually paving bottleneck intersections, no restrictions on tractor-trailers, and part-time "no parking" areas. And people still get in their cars and give it a shot. I think its insane, but they still do it. Stop them from parking that vehicle and you'd get results.
Gonna agree with Matt here. Those ATM workers provide a much needed service. The reson they are there is because cars tend to obey traffic laws less when in rush hour traffic. The human interaction and direction does help keep the insanity at bay. You THINK you don't want to keep traffic moving but unorganized gridlock traffic slows your bike ride down a lot. I don't have a problem with the cuts in this regard but I can think of a couple other city jobs that do less and could use a good cut, like Mayor of Chicago.

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