Rebuilding From the Failures of Vision Zero

Gersh Kuntzman shares the findings of a new report by Transportation Alternatives that analyzes traffic fatality data for New York City.

"Last month was the deadliest April since Mayor de Blasio took office in 2014 — and 2021, his last year in office, is on track to be the second deadliest year for road violence of his tenure, despite seven-plus years after the city officially adopted the Vision Zero initiative," writes Kuntzman to summarize the report's most topical findings.

Kuntzman shares more specifics, among others listed in the article:

• "Through April 30, 70 New Yorkers were killed in traffic violence — the deadliest start of any year since 2014 (when there were 72 fatalities)."
• "The pedestrian death toll is staggering: 43 pedestrians have been killed so far this year — the deadliest first four months for walkers of any year since Mayor de Blasio took office."

With statistics like that, the narrative about the success of Vision Zero in New York City has clearly changed since Mayor de Blasio touted the program's success on Queens Boulevard in Brooklyn, once known as the Boulevard of Death, in 2017.

Kuntzman also notes the prescriptions for traffic fatality reductions included in the Transportation Alternatives report, including fast tracking design improvements like those on Queens Boulevard in other parts of the city, creating more car-free spaces, and funding the city's Streets Master Plan, among other suggestions.

Reevaluating and reformulating Vision Zero is also the focus of a recent series of posts by Conor Shaw and Nick Sementelli for Greater Greater Washington, which offers solutions for Washington, D.C.'s Vision Zero program "after six years of failure."

People of every age, from all walks of life, using any form of transportation are more vulnerable today than they were when Mayor Bowser launched Vision Zero six years ago. When the campaign was announced, DC had experienced 26 fatalities on our streets the previous year. The Mayor was unambiguously clear in her goal: these deaths were unacceptable and, more importantly, preventable. “By 2024 we will do everything in our power to eliminate transportation fatalities or serious injuries.”

The 2016 report set an explicit target. To get to zero deaths on schedule, the District needed to see a 35% reduction every year. But the reality is that DC is not making any progress. Instead, things have gotten steadily worse: 37 people were killed last year, a 40% increase over the 2015 baseline.

To get Vision Zero back on track, Shaw and Sementelli suggest following the success of other cities, like Oslo, in slowing down automobiles and adopting a strategies actually show to "protect lives, increase mobility, and achieve greater equity in transportation." More specifics are added in a separate, follow up post, including:

• Implementing emergency "road diets" by reducing lanes on all arterial streets
• Reducing speed limits on all roads
• Deploying automated speed enforcement
• Reappropriating street space for public transportation, walking, and micromobility
• Making safe transportation modes free and charging more for deadly forms of transportation
• Adding oversight for the work of the District Department of Transportation and the City Council toward Vision Zero goals.

A lot more detail on each of those prescriptions is available in the source article.

It is not delusional to work toward Vision Zero goals—even if it's hard to look around at the results of Vision Zero programs, such as they are, and not tend toward skepticism. The city of Hoboken has implemented major changes to its streets, for example, and earlier this year completed a third year without traffic fatalities. For more prescriptions for how to actually commit to ending traffic fatalities, see a Planetizen feature by Angie Schmitt.