Safe streets

Commentary: L.A.’s promise for safer streets has stalled. But a ballot measure could restart the mobility plan

From LATimes.com

By Kerry Cavanaugh

In 2015, the Los Angeles City Council adopted an ambitious new transportation planthat called for adding hundreds of miles of bus-only lanes and protected bike lanes, along with sidewalk and streetscape improvements across the city. The Mobility Plan 2035 was designed to make L.A.’s car-dominated streets safer and more inviting for pedestrians, bicyclists and transit users over 20 years.

It was a huge shift in priority for a city so committed to the car that for decades it focused on relieving congestion and moving motorists as fast as possible. Mayor Eric Garcetti and a majority of the City Council drew national attention for agreeing to sacrifice some car lanes to make room for faster buses and safer cycling and walking.

But, as is so often the case in L.A., the implementation of the Mobility Plan has not matched its ambition.

Since its adoption, the city has only made bike, bus and pedestrian upgrades to 95 miles out of 3,137 miles identified in the plan — or 3% in a little more than six years. Time and again, city leaders have ignored or torpedoed bike and bus lanes outlined in the Mobility Plan. At this rate, it will take nearly 200 years — not 20 — to fulfill the plan’s vision.

Photo by Owen Lystrup on Unsplash

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Street Safety Groups to President Biden: Commit to a Federal Vision Zero Plan

From NYC.Streetsblog.org

By Gersh Kuntzman

President Biden must commit to a strategy to reduce road deaths in the United States to zero by 2050, a coalition of street safety groups told the new president even before his first full day in office.

On Wednesday, as the Biden Administration was still setting up its voicemail systems and disinfecting the press briefing room, more than 74 organizations sent a group letter to the White House reminding the new president of that which he knows so painfully well: that almost 40,000 Americans die every year on our roadways — and that government must do more to get that number moving to zero much faster.

“For decades, we have known the solutions in this country and watched other countries make incredible progress towards this goal, while we have lacked the leadership to make roadway safety a national priority in the United States,” says the letter, which is signed by such groups as Families for Safe Streets, Denver Streets Partnership, Governors Highway Safety Association, AAA, National Association of City Transportation Officials, League of American Bicyclists, Mothers Against Drunk Driving, Transportation Alternatives, Transportation for America, the Vision Zero Network, a former NHTSA chief of staff and Jersey City Mayor Steve Fulop. (New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, who committed his city to Vision Zero in 2014, is not on the letter.)

Photo by Noralí Nayla on Unsplash

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