Study: Road Design, Speed Key Factors in Pedestrian Deaths

A new study of traffic deaths in Tennessee found a strong correlation between more pedestrian deaths and more crashes on “straight, multi-lane roads with speed limits over 35 miles per hour,” known as ‘stroads,’ that advocates say “combine the features of neighborhood streets with a car-oriented roads to deadly effect.” Kea Wilson describes the study in Streetsblog USA.

The study’s authors acknowledge that the size of vehicles can also be a factor in how deadly crashes are, “But the more important thing that we should be focusing on — and it's something that urban transportation professionals have a lot more control over — is speed on urban arterials.”

The study notes that Tennessee did not necessarily build more arterials during the time span that pedestrian deaths rose, but study author Christopher Cherry “suspects that a rising number of residents simply have no choice but to walk on the state's most-dangerous roads, particularly as incomes fall and poor residents who can't afford cars are pushed out of walkable downtowns and towards the sprawling fringe.” In other words, the suburbanization of poverty is putting more low-income people in harm’s way. 

For Cherry, road design is a crucial key to improving safety. “We need to design roads where it’s almost impossible to kill someone.”