TSTC’s Most Dangerous Roads for Walking report, released earlier this week, generated a great deal of buzz in tri-state media. In such a diverse region, reactions to the report predictably varied from place to place. It is reassuring, however, to know that many state and local policymakers are already working toward making their roads safer for all users.
Long Island
Main Street (Route 25) in Smithtown, where six pedestrians died between 2004 and 2011, was put on a road diet and pedestrian safety improvements were implemented at intersections.
“We’ve had no deaths since, thank heavens,” said Mark Mancini, president of the Greater Smithtown Chamber of Commerce, which lobbied for the changes. “People would drive down Main Street at 55 mph like it was a four-lane highway before.” A state speed study found average speed had been reduced to 28 mph after the changes.
And it appears NYSDOT broke news on its new approach to pedestrian safety on Long Island:
State transportation department spokesman Beau Duffy said the agency is, for the first time, looking at designing safety programs for entire road “corridors” as well as specific intersections. The first of those efforts is under way on Hempstead Turnpike. A study of changes that could be made to Sunrise Highway, primarily in Nassau, is under way and should be completed this summer.
New York City
A New York Daily News article highlighted the difference between upper Broadway (above 96th Street) and lower Broadway.
[Broadway] above 96th St. is the worst of all, with a concentration of fatalities occurring in Washington Heights, where motorists access the George Washington Bridge. Only one fatal accident occurred south of 96th St., according to the Tri-State Transportation Campaign.
This tale of two streets may be the result of major traffic-calming measures such as pedestrian plazas and lane closures the Department of Transportation implemented along Broadway below Columbus Circle, the campaign said. […]
NYCDOT Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan crowed at the data. “Report after report affirms that safety is an investment strategy that works, underscoring the importance of sustaining and expanding this commitment.”
CBS New York produced an excellent summary of the report, but commentary from the hosts of morning talk show Live From the Couch came to a different conclusion about who is to blame for pedestrian deaths.
Connecticut
ConnDOT spokesperson Kevin Nursick agreed that roads should be designed with vulnerable users in mind, but he also suggested that pedestrians are sometimes to blame.
“For our part, I think the Tri-State Transportation Campaign makes some good points about having infrastructure that is more accessible to pedestrian and that is something we have focused on in the past couple of years in particular,” Nursick said. “When it comes to roadway design we make sure we’re providing the best amenities we can for bicyclists and pedestrians and it’s something we’ve made great strides on.”
However, he said the factor of human responsibility is of equal importance.
From 2009 thru 2011, there were 244 incidents involving pedestrians on the 117-mile section of route 1 from Greenwich to the Rhode Island border, Nursick said. In more than half the accidents, pedestrians were found to be at fault, including four of the six pedestrians killed on Route 1, he said.
Nursick said those numbers underscore a disregard on the part of both motorists and pedestrians about operating safely in the roadway, which can’t be solved by infrastructure changes.
“It shows that people are not using the infrastructure the way it is intended to be used,” he said.
New Jersey
Pedestrian fatalities fell only slightly in Bergen County, but leaders there expect streets will only become safer thanks to safety improvements and policy changes.
Stephen Lo Iacono, city manager, told NJ.com that Hackensack and Bergen County had made improvements to the lighting, traffic signals and crosswalks at the intersections between Summit and Prospect avenues and Essex Street since 2011. More improvements are planned for the areas east and west of Hackensack University Medical Center, which drives much of the traffic volume on Essex, he said. Since then, Hackensack has adopted a Complete Streets policy, which calls for roads to be designed to accommodate all modes of transportation, especially pedestrian, the Hackensack Chronicle reported.
In Hudson County, local leaders are relying less on infrastructure changes, and more on enforcement of speeding and distracted driving.
“I’ve assigned additional patrols to Kennedy Boulevard and utilized our modern technological advances to warn drivers of the dangers of speeding as well as texting while driving,” Hudson County Sheriff Frank Schillari said in a statement. “Through the collective efforts, the number of pedestrian fatalities has been reduced.”
While it’s reassuring that so many jurisdictions are taking pedestrian safety seriously, some hearts and minds are yet to be won. In an online poll that asked, “Who’s most to blame for the increase in pedestrain [sic] deaths in NJ?” 86 percent chose “Pedestrians themselves for not paying attention” (city planners and drivers received 10 percent and four percent, respectively).
