Safety
The Appalling Rollback of Truck Safety Provisions in the DRIVE Act
A battle is brewing over the Senate transportation bill’s approach to truck safety. Though large trucks are involved in crashes that kill nearly 4,000 people a year -- a number that has grown by 17 percent over the past five years -- the DRIVE Act actually rolls back what few protections exist.
August 28, 2015
Compelling Evidence That Wider Lanes Make City Streets More Dangerous
The "forgiving highway" approach to traffic engineering holds that wider is safer when it comes to street design. After decades of adherence to these standards, American cities are now criss-crossed by streets with 12-foot wide lanes. As Walkable City author Jeff Speck argued in CityLab last year, this is actually terrible for public safety and the pedestrian environment.
May 27, 2015
Safety in Numbers: Biking Is Safest in Nations With the Most People on Bikes
The more people get around by bike, the safer it is, according to the "safety in numbers" rule first popularized by researcher Peter Jacobsen.
February 27, 2015
Life-Saving Truck Design Fix Sidelined By Federal Inaction
This is the second post in a Streetsblog NYC series about safety features for large vehicles. Part one examined the case for truck side guards and New York City's attempt to require them for its fleet.
December 22, 2014
NHTSA Touts Decrease in Traffic Deaths, But 32,719 Ain’t No Vision Zero
Twenty-four-year-old Taja Wilson was killed near the Louisiana bayou in August when a driver swerved on the shoulder where she was walking. Noshat Nahian, age 8, was killed in a Queens crosswalk on his way to school in December by a tractor-trailer driver with a suspended license. Manuel Steeber, 37, was in a wheelchair when he was killed in Minneapolis while trying to cross an intersection with no crosswalk or traffic signal on a 40-mph road. One witness speculated that Steeber must have had a "death wish."
December 22, 2014
Here’s How Much Safer Transit Is Compared to Driving
Keep this in mind the next time a high-profile train crash generates more press coverage than a year's worth of car wrecks: Despite the media sensationalism and overwrought regulatory responses that follow such events, transit is already a lot safer than driving.
December 19, 2014
DeFazio, Norton, and Larsen Take on Dangerous Street Design
Rep. Peter DeFazio (D-OR) is already proving that he’ll put some muscle into the fight for bike and pedestrian safety in his new post as ranking member of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee.
December 18, 2014
Kentucky Threatens 17 Louisville Street Trees, Citing Safety [Updated]
Here's a classic story of traffic engineering myopia. Officials at the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet are threatening to remove 17 newly planted street trees in a Louisville suburb.
December 17, 2014
Hastily-Debated Collins Measure Could Put More Tired Truckers on the Road
It just wouldn’t be Congress if we weren’t trying to debate substantive policy changes, with drastic implications for public safety, with a government shutdown deadline fast approaching.
December 9, 2014