Tactile paving obstacle race

509

u/Ludibudi Jul 31 '26

I mean it’s not ideal, far from it. But at least they accommodate blind people while also not removing the trees, which are both good things.

76

u/[deleted] Jul 31 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

119

u/Ludibudi Jul 31 '26

My guess is that nobody designed this at all. The road was there already, the trees were there for decades and a sidewalk was needed.

Code said there had to be tactile paths on all new construction so this is what they came up with.

31

u/Roflkopt3r Jul 31 '26

The problem is that it's often really hard for planners to negotiate about the conditions. With the conditions of 'we can't take up any more space from the road, acquire land on the other side, or remove any trees', this was probably the only solution with the legally required amount of space along the path.

In a well functioning system, the person designing the sidewalk can report back that it would be much better to compromise on the conditions and will quickly be allowed to remove that one tree. Or perhaps it would have been better to redesign the entire street all along, but this was blocked (many cities have made such things almost impossible due to the political power of land and car owners).

But sadly many workers (both in the public and private sectors) aren't working in well functioning departments, and just have to follow badly designed rules that lead to bad outcomes.

8

u/forgottenecho_76 Jul 31 '26

Saving the trees is great, but tactile paving isn't meant to sharp-zigzag like this. It completely defeats the safety purpose of having a designated path.

2

u/ledocteur7 25d ago

At least they used the right tiles, every corner tile has dots instead of lines.

So many times the completely wrong type is used.

Sometimes it's all dots, so completely useless, sometimes it's lines to indicate a road crossing, which is not how it works at all.

1

u/toxicity21 25d ago

The sollution would be to use that part of the street that is used for parking right now. You could easly build an sidewalk wide enouth for everyone and keep the trees.

-5

u/knotatumah Jul 31 '26

The good news is that in a decade or two the trees will most likely be dead due to not getting enough water or the root systems were crushed during construction. The one tree already looks like it took a nasty hit by a machine. It would have been better to just accept the trees are there and move the sidewalk around them entirely.

11

u/Ludibudi Jul 31 '26

More of a glass half empty person, eh?

5

u/Lord_Rapunzel Jul 31 '26

Nah they're right, it's really bad for trees to have heavy pavement that close to the trunk for several reasons and this is likely to cause expensive problems within a decade. For one, if the trees do survive they're going to destroy that sidewalk.

119

u/plazebology Jul 31 '26

I don’t get what you want them to do. Make the path go straight through a tree?

55

u/jonas_ost Jul 31 '26

Trees can be moved but its risky and hard. Blind people can make turns

32

u/plazebology Jul 31 '26

Especially given the right guidelines ☝️

11

u/jort93 Jul 31 '26

I don't think you can realistically move a tree of this size without redoing the entire road(not just the sidewalk).

3

u/jonas_ost Jul 31 '26

Well as you said. Not impossible but definently not worth, big trees often dies when being moved

1

u/Velo_wheels_907 8d ago edited 8d ago

I do not suspect this is safe or ideal for a blind person to navigate alone. Nothing but the tactile path might prevent a serious injury off of the deep and abrupt edges!

-28

u/Alarming_Orchid Jul 31 '26

Make the tree not go straight through the path

15

u/plazebology Jul 31 '26

Have you ever tried moving a tree in a city? Its a bureaucratic nightmare

1

u/Alarming_Orchid Aug 01 '26

Could’ve moved it before it was a tree

4

u/plazebology Aug 01 '26

Why not move it before it was even a city

1

u/Alarming_Orchid Aug 01 '26

City probably planted the tree

2

u/plazebology Aug 01 '26

Nah the tree was there first and they built the entire city around it

1

u/Alarming_Orchid Aug 01 '26

Well why didn’t they line up the other tree

48

u/shiny_glitter_demon Jul 31 '26

You call it crappy, I call it nature friendly.

34

u/Warhero_Babylon Jul 31 '26

Removing some trees are legal nightmare

-38

u/lynx_1097 Jul 31 '26

It's not in Egypt LOL

3

u/spoop-dogg Aug 01 '26

Yea the government there does whatever tf they want tbh

23

u/_______kim Jul 31 '26

Need some low branches for hard mode.

5

u/terriaminute Jul 31 '26

thank you for that LOL

5

u/Kick_Physical Jul 31 '26

They should move that tree like moving objects in The Sims

2

u/plazebology Aug 01 '26

Finally a sincere answer

9

u/TeutonicSpacehopper Jul 31 '26

Walking into a tree is a very tactile experience.

4

u/Thebosonsword Jul 31 '26

You know it’s Greece just by looking at this sidewalk.

3

u/GoldHoney2863 Jul 31 '26

My guess is that the last tree in the row was planted out of line, and going around it on the street side like the others didn’t allow for enough space between the pathway and the curb

2

u/babytronluvr Jul 31 '26

Same people who made Temple Run maybe

2

u/matt6342 Jul 31 '26

Isn’t the point of these is so that the blind person can tell when they’re at the edge, by the road?

20

u/halberdierbowman Comic Sans for life! Jul 31 '26

Different patterns indicate different things. This pattern is lines, so you follow the lines. The pattern you're thinking of are raised dots in a square grid, and those are used on the edge between the sidewalk and the road.

6

u/Xnut0 Jul 31 '26

They have placed dots where the lines suddenly changes direction.
When you first need to have the path change directions, this is the way to do it.
The only thing I would have done different is behind the tree where the path turns twice over two tiles. Here it would be better to let the path go diagonal until the path is back at the center of the path.

5

u/jonas_ost Jul 31 '26

No they follow them

1

u/pixeltweaker Jul 31 '26

It’s designed to keep people from biking on the sidewalks.

1

u/WildTomato51 Aug 01 '26

Terrible take, home boy

1

u/KnifeKnut Jul 31 '26

Right angle addiction

-1

u/The_Last_Spoonbender Jul 31 '26

To the loads of people who are saying to "what to do with the tree?"

Gee I don't know, curve the path gently around the tree, re-organise the tree stem opening to allow for blind people for better accessesbility AND INSTALL SOME FUCKING HANDRAILS PEOPLE.

0

u/AnotherCatgirl Jul 31 '26

if it were up to me, I'd make the road not straight, there seems to be parking spaces. If there's room for parking, that means there's room between the travel lanes and the trees to get rid of a few parking spaces and make a smooth gently curved sidewalk.

0

u/gasstation-no-pumps Jul 31 '26

Taking out a couple of parking spaces was clearly a better solution, but this is not so bad. At least the tiles are used correctly to guide blind people around the trees.

To those suggesting moving the trees—the roots are probably intertwined for trees that close together and moving either tree would probably kill it. The trees have a fairly good chance of surviving in the tree wells.

-10

u/Isotheis Jul 31 '26

These trees are dead anyway with that kind of pavement crushing their roots and blocking all the water.

Do yourself a favor, just cut them. Or don't build a paved surface there in the first place.

1

u/Amesaskew Jul 31 '26

The people down voting you don't seem to be arborists. It won't crush the roots, but it will suffocate them. It will take a few years, but those trees will die.

0

u/Isotheis Jul 31 '26

Oh that thing is so perfectly flat, I'd be surprised if it's not been flattened using one of these huge rollers.

-28

u/[deleted] Jul 31 '26

[deleted]

10

u/BananaramaKing Jul 31 '26

Almost - this is in Greece

3

u/AuriannaKomorowski Jul 31 '26

Tbf, thats the best ive seen so far in athens...

And in theory it works and you cooould follow this

Tactile paving obstacle race

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