Five Minute Gripe: Ashley Drive, Tampa, Florida.

Photo: Ashley Drive at Cass Street, as seen from the North-West corner, Tampa, FL.
Map: Provided by Google Maps

This intersection is the absolute bane of those of us who commute on foot here in Tampa, FL.
Ashley St. (left) is a two way street, with southbound traffic coming freshly off the Interstate only a block north of this crossing.
Cass St. (right) is a one way street, just entering downtown Tampa.

Ashley, going southbound, has four lanes going straight across, and a single turn lane. The northbound half of the street has two lanes going normally, and a turn lane that starts a block earlier.

Cass Street has four lanes, with one of them dedicated to turning left, and one other a split left-straight lane.

The issue with this is,
When you try to cross Ashley Street on foot, using the pedestrian signals, and you’re headed East, it’s nearly impossible to do, because of two things:

• The people turning from Cass to Ashley seemingly ignore pedestrians until they’re about to hit one. This gets to be annoying as all hell.
• The crosswalk indicator goes from Walk, to a flashing Don’t Walk in a matter of mere seconds (About five seconds, to be specific).

Heading West is only marginally better, as you get the chance to get across the street a little early, due to slower traffic headed North, combined with entering the crosswalk early, before the Walk signal is illuminated.

The entire street needs improvement with its walk signals, but this spot is most relevant to me since I cross here, or a block north, to go to the Public Library.

Argh, indeed.