MEMPHIS, Tenn. — The intersection of Sam Cooper and Tillman Avenue is a well-known trouble spot when it comes to pedestrians and bicyclists trying to maneuver the area that has heavy vehicle traffic.
Whether you are walking or biking, Sam Cooper and Tillman is a tough thoroughfare.
“Especially in a certain time of the evening. It’s a lot of people I guess getting off work,” says Debra West, who works in the area.
Monday night 40-year-old Zachary Walls, who was on a bicycle, was hit and killed by a vehicle driven by 50-year-old Solomon Johnson at Sam Cooper and Tillman. Johnson was arrested for driving while his license was suspended, revoked or canceled.
The area of Sam Cooper and Tillman is already on the radar of city planners who study troubled traffic spots.
They say the busy intersection where the expressway virtually ends has a lot of issues.
“So you have very high-speed traffic that was going maybe 60 miles an hours slowing down to 40 or 45, trying to slow down,” says Nicholas Oyler with the Memphis Urban Area Metropolitan Planning Organization.
Last year WREG told you about dangerous intersections the city is targeting for improvements by installing islands and prominently marking crosswalks.
The Sam Cooper and Tillman intersection is just one section of some 15-hundred miles of sidewalk and bike lane improvements the Metropolitan Planning Organization has recommended to the City.
“It’s a lot. It’s not gonna happen overnight. It takes a lot of funding, but the idea is that piece by piece the city of Memphis and other jurisdictions will implement all the recommendations that we have made,” says Oyler.
In six months, he says, bike lanes will be added to Tillman across Sam Cooper to Broad, giving walkers and bike riders their own lane of traffic as everyone tries to make it through safely.
“I try to be careful, take my time. Follow the rules. When it’s a stop sign, stop, when it’s a red light, stop. When it’s a yellow light, don’t try to run and beat it. Slow down, “says west.
The latest bike and pedestrian plan from the Metropolitan Planning Organization was just adopted in November and went to the city in January.
It can be used as the city applies for federal and state grants to upgrade problem intersections.