Recent Streetsblog SF posts about Safety

Compelling Evidence That Wider Lanes Make City Streets More Dangerous

By Angie Schmitt | May 27, 2015 | No Comments

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. […]

FHWA Proposes to Let States Fail Their Own Safety Goals With Impunity

By Tanya Snyder | Mar 14, 2014 | No Comments

Secretary Anthony Foxx has made clear that safety — and specifically, safety for bicyclists and pedestrians — is a priority of his administration. If that’s true, his administration sure has a funny way of showing it. The Federal Highway Administration’s proposal on safety performance measures allows states to fail to meet half their own safety […]

Menlo Park Expands Red Light Photo Enforcement Program

By Andrew Boone | Sep 4, 2013 | 43 Comments

Last week, the Menlo Park City Council voted to extend its red light photo enforcement program for an additional five years and add a fifth red light camera at the intersection of Bayfront Expressway and Chilco Street, where 20 collisions have resulted in 14 injuries and one fatality since 2008. A temporary test camera installed […]

Sunnyvale Latest City to Consider Anti-Harassment Law for Bike Riders

By Bryan Goebel | Jul 9, 2012 | 11 Comments

A groundbreaking law adopted in Los Angeles almost one year ago that allows bicycle riders to take civil action against drivers who harass them continues to generate local and national interest, with Sunnyvale becoming the latest city to consider enacting protections. “So many (drivers) seem to think it’s like basketball rules: no hit, no foul. […]

Mapping the Consequences of Our Automobile Addiction

By Tanya Snyder | Nov 23, 2011 | No Comments

Leave it to the Brits to create an incredible tool for examining America’s own crisis of traffic fatalities. Behold this somber map, made by ITO World, a UK-based transportation information firm. Each dot on the map is a traffic-related death. The entire eastern United States is blanketed with them. The purple dots represent vehicle occupants […]

Mayor, SFMTA, Walk SF Announce First 15 MPH School Zone

By Bryan Goebel | Aug 18, 2011 | 16 Comments

San Francisco became the first large California city to implement a 15 mph speed zone around a school this morning, as SFMTA workers installed one of four signs that will go up around George Peabody Elementary School on 7th Avenue in the Richmond District. It’s part of a groundbreaking citywide initiative pushed by walking advocates […]

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