Reverse traffic lanes — sometimes referred to as "suicide lanes" — are meant to ease congestion in central Phoenix, but critics say the road rules are confusing and dangerous. Now the Phoenix City Council will address a petition to get rid of them.
The reverse lanes were added to Seventh Avenue and Seventh Street more than 40 years ago when Phoenix was growing its downtown core. Traffic headed toward downtown starting at Northern and Dunlap avenues gets the extra lane during the morning rush, and the reverse happens for the evening commute. Other times and on weekends, it’s used as a left turn lane in both directions.
“Depending on where you live, it can be really, really challenging to even get home. People have to make a lot of weird turns. People use parking lots to kind of cut through in weird ways and do weird U-turns,” said community activist Stacey Champion.
Champion lives in Phoenix and started the petition, which the City Council will take up in its meeting on Wednesday, May 21.
“It's going to be really important to get people to show up at that council meeting, either in person or virtually or over the phone, to let the city of Phoenix know that it's time for them to actually go and they need to stop kicking the can down the road,” she said.
Research by the local organization Strong Towns Phoenix says reverse lanes cause twice as many crashes.
The city released a study in 2021 that found that a partial or complete elimination of those lanes would increase travel delays, traffic congestion and associated crashes.
KJZZ's Jill Ryan contributed to this report.
