In the Space Race, Head-In Usually Wins Over Angle Parking
Dear Street Smart:
I’m wondering why most parking lots have their spaces striped on a 90-degree angle, especially on small lots where it takes a lot of maneuvering to get in and out of these cramped spaces. To me, it makes much more sense to stripe these spaces on a 45-degree angle.
Is there a law which mandates how a parking lot should be divided?
John Sinon
Garden Grove
The short answer is no, according to Jim Drago, a spokesman for Caltrans. While cities routinely regulate how many parking spaces businesses must have, the layout generally is left up to developers. And because straight lines allow for more spaces, most opt that way.
“We used to fight about this all the time,” Drago said of his years as a member of the design review commission for the city of Roseville, near Sacramento. “Most of the developers wanted the straight-in slots because they could get more parking spaces in less space.”
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Dear Street Smart:
As a follow-up to another letter inquiring on accident statistics for groups of drivers such as truck drivers and women aged 18 to 45, I was wondering if you would print the accident rate for female drivers 60 to 75?
Laurie Hoyt
Huntington Beach
The earlier column reported that 6.4% of the male drivers in California are likely to be in accidents involving injury or death in a given year, compared to 4.5% of the female drivers aged 18 to 45.
The comparable statistics for women drivers between the ages of 60 and 75 are dramatically better. In 1995, according to Evan Noshoff, a spokesman for the Department of Motor Vehicles, only .8% of those drivers were in such accidents.
“They are involved in fewer accidents than any other group,” Noshoff said.
The accident rate for men 60 to 75 was 1.25%.
Taking into account that women of that age also tend to drive less than any other group, however, somewhat levels the field. Per 100,000 miles of driving, Noshoff said, women 60 to 75 averaged about .47 accidents in 1995, slightly more than men age 25 to 29.
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Dear Street Smart:
Why are freeway signs so often illuminated by fixtures at the bottom, directing light upward toward the sign?
If fixtures were top-mounted, some light would be reflected or directed onto vehicles and the road below and there would be a bit of added benefit to drivers’ vision at night. We are paying for power for all these signs. Why not get the most value out of it?
L. David Taylor
Huntington Beach
It’s a matter of safety and economics, according to Maureena Duran-Rojas, a spokeswoman for Caltrans.
Freeway signs have catwalks along their bases for maintenance and cleaning. The nature of the design, she said, makes it more cost effective to place lighting on the catwalk rather than at the top of the sign.
“The way the structure is built with the catwalk at the bottom,” Duran-Rojas said, “all we have to do is add an extension for the lights. If we were to put the lights at the top, we would have to install a runner there, which is more costly. We already have a runner at the bottom.”
There is a safety reason for the upward-pointing lights as well.
“Light coming from the top would create shadows that might be seen on the pavement and could confuse motorists,” she said.
Street Smart appears Mondays in The Times Orange County Edition. Readers are invited to submit comments and questions about traffic, commuting and what makes it difficult to get around in Orange County. Include simple sketches if helpful. Letters may be published in upcoming columns. Please write to David Haldane, c/o Street Smart, The Times Orange County, P.O. Box 2008, Costa Mesa, Calif. 92626, send faxes to 966-7711 or e-mail him David.Haldane@latimes.com Include your full name, address and day and evening phone numbers. Letters may be edited, and no anonymous letters will be accepted.
