I'm still not entirely convinced that the planners did NOT try to kill off as many people as possible in as stealthy a manner as they could think of. It's probably some sick insider joke. "Hahaha, I got them to stick with the old and inefficient crossroads design so traffic on the main road will need to stop regularly, plus we get to preserve even more space for the walkways!" "Oh god! Just think of all the rage-fueled accidents that will cause!" *proceeds to high-five*
I for one love how they planted a hydrant right in the middle of the walkway exactly where it is actually a bit smaller (on a road leading off the main road that they had to rip up and remake in the process of building the tunnel). It's like a big extended middle finger to the local community that has to shuffle past (or sometimes into) it on their way to some public transport stops, or the parents delivering their kids to the local kindergarten.
That road? Right next to the local Ärztehaus, a building dedicated to medical practitioners (and beauty parlours and such stuff). And the walkway is smaller there because they forgot that a multi-story building full of doctors
might need short-term parking spaces for their patients. It's not like they were there before, right? Right?!?
Oh, and in the process of redesigning the walkway for the parking spaces that so
deviously snuck up on them they also re-introduced the standard raised design of the walkway and demolished one of two ramps that augmented the existing stairs for, oh, I don't know, maybe the sick people in their wheelchairs trying to get to their doctors.
Result: The Ärztehaus has lost many facilities - they mostly closed shop indefinitely, but some chose to relocate to other nearby buildings.
I repeat, we now have a multi story building supposedly for medical experts that many medical experts don't want to use since their patients can't really get to them unless they wait for one of the three supposedly short-time parking spaces to become accessible. And after that they have to walk/drive/hop/crawl the length of the building past one needless constriction if they can't use stairs - that is if they can get out of their cars in the first place because of the raised design that might necessitate outside help for people in a wheelchair.
But hey, the Italian bistro that moved in recently is pretty nice I guess. Plus, it overlooks the hydrant and parking spaces, perfect for people watching.
Awe-inspiring stuff.
Oh, and for the record, the hydrant came after the parking space thing. It would have been excusable the other way around. Somewhat. I mean, it's still a fucking hydrant smack in the middle as opposed to on the sides of a public walkway.
