Portland tailors each crosswalk’s design to its location. In general, streets with more travel lanes, higher speeds and a greater number of people driving, walking and biking need extra elements to meet safety standards.
PBOT crosswalk guidelines have two parts:
- A flow chart describes how Portland identifies crosswalks needing safety enhancements.
- If the flow chart finds that a location needs enhancements, PBOT engineers select from a suite of options to meet safety standards.
Portland sites and designs marked crosswalks based on best practices. The information on this page is simplified for clarity, but it provides a general overview of the process Portland follows to site and design crosswalks.
Step 1. Evaluate a site to determine if crosswalk enhancements would improve safety
Step 2. If the flow chart indicates enhancements would improve safety, PBOT uses the following design guidelines
All proposed marked crosswalks are reviewed by an engineer
Please note: The information on this page contains broad guidelines for installation of marked crosswalks and other pedestrian improvements at uncontrolled (no signal) locations. The information is an approximation of recommended crossing treatments. As pedestrian or bike crossing volumes and/or street widths increase, it is likely that the treatment recommended by an engineer will be a higher level than the table shows. You can view traffic count information here.
Portland typically uses the following documents to determine the appropriate crossing type: