It’s near midnight on January 28th as I write this.  As everyone wakes up on the 29th, we will have a rare opportunity in the Triangle to see how the snow reveals which parts of our intersections are not needed to allow cars to move freely.  Clarence Eckerson of Streetfilms (see 3-minute video below) has pioneered the art of taking film of leftover snow and plowed roadways to show where intersection treatments for pedestrians could be improved, while keeping traffic moving at lower and friendler-to-pedestrians speeds.

This type of photography has gotten its own Twitter hashtag this winter, combining “snow” and “neckdown”- the term for narrowing a roadway at an intersection, into “#SNECKDOWN.”  Here’s a screen capture of a great example from a few days ago in Massachusetts:

So keep your camera handy on Wednesday and document our local #sneckdowns!  Who knows when we’ll have this chance again…