Pedestrian Treatments in Cambridge

The treatments in Cambridge seemed to be an effort that has been significant in the past several years. The first intersection I encountered was a pedestrian signal outside of the "T" station at Cambridge Center adjacent to the MIT Co-op bookstore. The pedestrian refuge was sufficient to allow people to wait. There was a push button on either side of the street, but most people weren't bothering to push the button because the traffic was fairly slow and the risk of crossing against the signal was limited.
The state las in Massachusettes appear to be yield to pedestrians, which was reinforced many times with supplementary signs in the road and like these that are more substantial pole mounted signs.
  I was reviewing the FHWA website on the topic of Safety at Unsignalized Intersections and the information is dated and could stand an update.  The work completed by the National Cooperative Highway Research Program NCHRP 562/Transit Cooperative Research Program serves to provide a more urban focus that is applicable for communities like Cambridge and Portland. 
As I walked through Cambridge I came across pedestrian scramble installations and the City uses leading pedestrian intervals (LPI) at most all of the traffic signals. The LPI is a very short duration (most I saw were 3 seconds) which is significant in a cycle length as short as 90 seconds. The City also timed the walk with the countdown, which I argue limits your ability to provide transit signal priority because of the lack of intelligence in the countdown pedestrian indications (they simply repeat the interval in the controller that is flashing don't walk from the previous cycle).

Cycletrack and Blue Marking for Conflict & Transition Zones in Cambridge

Cambridge, MA was one of the earliest adopters of cycletracks in the U.S. and this was my first time cycling on the facility which is adjacent to the MIT campus. The cycletrack was enjoyable to ride on and reminded me of many of the Dutch cycletracks I had used last summer or the one way facilities common in Copenhagen.  The nature of having the cycling facility flush with the driveway (which is lower speed traffic) is a nice touch. The markings at the driveway denote the potential for a conflict or a transition at the locations where the cycletrack is ending.
The City was using the blue markings prior to the feedback the City of Portland got related to using green and apparently they haven't had the need to go back and refresh the markings.  
The treatment that was worth noting was the yield to bikes sign and the lane configuration sign which included the blue bike lane to indicate to motorists that the lane exists and there should be an awareness of the potential for a conflict. The first time I saw the sign, I had a hard time noting the bike marking in the lane, the black and blue does not provide a very good contrast that is easy to pick up and doesn't offer a consistent marking for the bike symbol, I tend to prefer the addition of the rider to match the striping, but that's a detail that's something to talk with the Manual of Uniform Traffic Control Devices (MUTCD) National Committee about this week.    
This post reminded me of the early work done by Alta to summarize some of the facilities in 2009, which seemed like an eternity ago what with the Green Lane Project and so much emphasis on cycletracks and protected facilities in the past several years.