The city’s efforts to make roads safer are paying off.
Milwaukee’s efforts to improve road safety through changes in the physical design of roads is paying off, with city data showing a reduction of 27 percent in speeding at projects completed in 2024. According to a piece by Jeramey Jannene in Urban Milwaukee, projects completed in 2023 led to a 28 percent reduction in “life-changing injury crashes” and reduced crashes by 15 percent and injury crashes by 7 percent.
The effort was spearheaded by Mayor Cavalier Johnson, who declared reckless driving a public safety crisis in 2021. Thanks to the interventions, “Certain streets have shown great speed reductions, either with raised crosswalks or street reconfigurations. A speed hump on W. Windlake Avenue cut the percentage of motorists exceeding the speed limit from 30% to 2%. A two-way protected bike lane and other calming measures on Van Buren Street cut speeding from 20% to 3%.” The city has plans to complete 60 traffic calming projects by the end of 2025.
FULL STORY: New Speed Data Shows Dramatic Impact of Milwaukee’s Traffic Calming Efforts
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Journal of the American Planning Association