The intersection of Georgetown Road and 71st Street is located on the Northwest side of the city, just east of Eagle Creek Park. The intersection is circled on the map in red.
Incidents
June 1, 2024 / Pedestrian Death (known incident not yet reviewed by FCRB or included on MPO map below)
August 5, 2016 / Pedestrian Death (pre-dates FCRB)
Two other non-death Pedestrian incidents since 2015
Georgetown Road is also part of the Indy MPO's High Injury Network from 71st Street to Lafayette Road. You can learn more about the High Injury Network and view the map here: Maps | MPO (indympo.org). Like Madison Avenue from our previous post, the High Injury segment of Georgetown is also an IndyGo route (see Image B below).
Image A / Indy MPO crash data of this area from 2015 thru May 2024. Red dot is vehicle. Blue dot is pedestrian. Green dot is cyclist. Dark red outline is a death.
Image B / Georgetown and 71st is circled in Red
What does the Fatal Crash Review Board say?
The pedestrian incident that happened in June has not yet been reviewed. But I do need to point out a vehicle-on-vehicle incident that was reviewed from September 2023 (Master Record Number: 904344995). A garbage truck was traveling west on 71st Street and made a left turn so quickly that it rolled over on top of a second vehicle and instantly killed that vehicle's driver. The FCRB had no recommendations for preventing something like this from happening again.
Immediate Term Changes
71st Street is designed like an interstate. Look at the image below and guess the speed limit.
Image C / How fast do you think you could go on this stretch of 71st Street if you ignored the speed limit?
According to the signs that you can see if you visit via street view, the speed limit is 40 mph. If you stood on the side of this road for an hour with a radar gun, what do you think the top recorded speed would be?
Both 71st Street and Georgetown give drivers SOOOO much space. Look at the street view on both streets. The sight line on each road basically ends at the horizon. We need temporary measures that break up those sight lines, take away some space for driver improvisation, and create some pedestrian islands.
First, I'm breaking up the center lane on 71st Street from Coffman Road to Zionsville Road. Similar to the tactical project from 10th Street, we'll use jersey barriers and large planters to put evergreen trees down the full run until the median begins near Zionsville Road. I would also use those instances to squeeze the two traffic lanes on each side with additional barriers. This will slow down traffic dramatically.
Image D / These would be placed every 50-100 yards and could easily be adjusted if needed.
Our problem intersection is a tough one for non-permanent changes. This is further explained in the next section, but we can't put up anything that's going to impede freight traffic. My main strategy at the intersection is to encourage folks to use the south and east crossings.
Make sure the crosswalks are painted and harden the right turn lanes on three of the corners.
The really excessive right turn lane south of the intersection on Georgetown would also be blocked. The bus would stop in the lane instead of pulling over because of this change, but I would defer to IndyGo if they don't want that.
Add crosswalk markings to the gas station driveways.
One other thing I'd like to point out from the image below is the grocery store in the bottom left. Please notice how little thought was given to non-drivers coming from 71st or Georgetown. We can see the bus stops on Georgetown and that riders will just have to walk in the street all the way to the door. Not great!
Image E / Immediate changes
I'm including this disclaimer about non-permanent changes on all posts: Following through with these non-permanent changes would be a DRAMATIC culture shift for the city and DPW. It will take a mandate from the council and mayor to make non-permanent changes. This is an issue that should be pushed and is our biggest current failure in this crisis.
Long Term Changes
There is a huge problem with this area if you are a human trying to exist. I'd like to point out a few things from the map below. First, our intersection is circled in red. Next, we've got two access points to I465 in yellow. But what's the big orange outline? It's a massive commercial area where zero people live. When we're thinking about how to improve this area, we have to accept the reality that there are a large number of daily residents, including freight traffic, trying to arrive and leave during the work week.
Image F / A map of constraints to consider in this area.
The next constraint with this area is the blue box at the bottom of the map. Inside this area and slightly off the map is Pike High School, Lincoln Middle School, and Central Elementary School. Very easy to imagine how the orange area and the blue area conflict pretty much daily. And just by looking at the map, you can see how those conflicts end up at our intersection.
Last thing before the plan. The two constraints of this area are also massive opportunities to shift drivers to other modes and create less traffic (what a concept!). How many people do you think are walking or biking to school/work in this area? How many people work in the orange box that would ride the bus if the surrounding infrastructure and bus stops were better? We need to be thinking about ALL MODES when we're looking at these issues.
THE PLAN!
Reimagine 71st Street from Georgetown to Zionsville
Encourage ped/bike use on the south side of 71st to avoid conflicts with commercial traffic exiting the area outlined in orange.
Encourage ped/bike access to the Pike campus
Upgrade the bus stops on Georgetown Road and give it a road diet
Harden and armor all pedestrian crossings of 71st Street with curbs, raised crossings, and pedestrian islands.
First, we reimagine the 71st Street corridor from Zionsville to Georgetown. There may come a post where I fail to build a roundabout, but it is not this post. The reason for the roundabouts here is it takes away the option for drivers to make big mistakes. In this newly imagined corridor, there isn't a single place where someone can get t-boned by another driver going 50 mph. That's a huge safety improvement!
This reimagined corridor also shows you how we get 71st down to two travel lanes. 71st currently becomes a three-lane road (two travel and one center turn lane) immediately after Georgetown Road. By making that transition before the intersection, we save some road maintenance money and greatly simplify our focus intersection. Roads that lose access because of the new median on 71st will simply use the next roundabout to make a much safer return to where they needed to go.
This also shows us the massive kid-friendly path that's being added to the south-side of the corridor. Plenty of space for bikes and pedestrians trying to get to the Pike Township campus. There could also be mid-block crossings with pedestrian crossings where needed (not shown in the image).
We also have to consider the commercial traffic in this area. That's why all of our roundabouts receive substantial truck aprons. A truck apron an area inside the roundabout with a rounded curb that is reinforced and designed to handle the substantial weight of freight traffic. The curb should be substantial enough that drivers aren't tempted to just drive over them to get through the roundabout faster (see the new Southeastern and English roundabout for an example of what not to do).
Image G / A truck apron and a nice nod to MSD Pike Township that could be included in the roundabout
Image H / The new 71st Street corridor between Georgetown and Zionsville Road. Not to scale.
Next, our problem intersection. With 71st Street down to two travel lanes, we'll mirror that treatment on Georgetown and give it some nice medians for about a block and a half. Georgetown could continue the corridor with more roundabouts and keep the median OR transition back to two travel lanes with a center turn lane at the edge of the map (more on that in a moment).
Our simple roundabout gives us simple crossings for peds/bikes. Since a pedestrian island is included on every side, it's never necessary to cross more than a single lane of traffic at a time. You had to cross five lanes at a time in the old configuration!
Our massive mixed used path that leads to the school is set to end at this intersection. There's not currently space to extend it down 71st Street, but it's feasible to take it down Georgetown in either direction if you want to expand the scope of the project.
I also want to highlight the bus stops here. IndyGo has recently built some "Super Stops" downtown. I'm calling these stops Super Lite. Basically there is a shelter, benches, the stop bumps out to the roadway, and the stop is raised to allow near-level boarding with the bus. Why though? Because of the grocery store. Put upgraded infrastructure around the places people want to go! Hopefully we could also force the property owners to build some pedestrian access through the parking lot (by changing city codes or forcing them to cross the current configuration of 71st over and over until they agree).
Image J / The updated intersection of 71st and Georgetown. This corridor design could be extended north and south on Georgetown if we had the funds.
It's well known that we have funding constraints. So I've also drawn up a less costly refresh of the Georgetown corridor that would begin at the edge of our map above. Similar to the immediate changes that were recommended on 71st, I would add permanent plantings to the center turn lanes on Georgetown. This would provide a great adjustment to the sight lines and give us some unique opportunities for the bus stops as shown below.
Image K / The Georgetown Road corridor from 86th to Lafayette. Roundabouts could be added at certain intersections where desired (62nd and 56th would be good choices).
I would defer to IndyGo on which layout they prefer for the bus stops. We have a culture of unsafe driving in our city, so I believe drivers will unfortunately pass the bus either way. Going around the planter and into the opposite travel lane would obviously be much more dangerous.
Council District
We're on the border of District 1 and District 6 this week. I'm breaking the tie by saying more of these changes would occur in district 6 if you did both corridors. As a reminder, my goal is to feature an unsafe location in all 25 council districts. Council District 6 is, once again, an oddly shapely district that goes as far north as 79th Street and as far south as 38th Street. It includes Northwestway Park, a sliver of 465, a small slice of the White River, and numerous Pike School District campuses.
Carlos Perkins is the representative for District 6
Joined council in 2024 and could be reelected/challenged in 2028
I truly do not care what political party a City Councilor is affiliated with, so that will not be listed in these posts. Any person can be an ally or an adversary in this fight, as safety advocates have already discovered.
Props to Carlos on our best official headshot so far. Take notes councilors.
Contact Carlos Perkins: 200 E. Washington St., Suite T441 Indianapolis, IN 46204 317.797.5170 |  |
Other Involved Districts
Georgetown extends into other districts, so let your councilors know if you see something you like or have other ideas of your own!
District 1 (next district north) Leroy Robinson 200 E. Washington St., Suite T441 Indianapolis, IN 46204 317.327.4242 |  |
District 5 (next district south) Maggie A. Lewis 200 E. Washington St., Suite T441 Indianapolis, IN 46204 317.327.4242 |  |