April 10, 2007

Paul Steely White 212-629-8080

To save lives, encourage more physical activity, reduce automobile use and create a more sustainable city, New York City must do more to make walking safer and more inviting. Therefore, Transportation Alternatives commends the New York City Council, the Council's Transportation Committee and its Chair, John Liu, for holding an oversight hearing on pedestrian safety.

Pedestrians obeying the law and crossing in crosswalks with the light are struck by motor vehicles with horrifying regularity. The locations of most of these crashes are along long-time problem streets like Hylan Boulevard in Staten Island, Flatbush Avenue in Brooklyn, 9th Avenue in Manhattan, Roosevelt Avenue in Queens and the Grand Concourse in the Bronx and at well documented problem intersections. In fact, 50% of pedestrian injuries and fatalities happen at 10% of NYC intersections.

To the City's credit, a handful of the worst streets and intersections have received complete sets of pedestrian safety improvements such as extended pedestrian crossing time, protected waiting areas and narrower travel lanes. But the fact is that thousands of city streets are still incomplete in that they lack these necessary safety improvements. That there are still over 10,000 pedestrian injuries every year is a tragic testament to this fact.

To extend pedestrian safety to more streets and intersections, Transportation Alternatives urges the New York City Council, the Council's Transportation Committee and its Chair, John Liu to champion a Pedestrian Safety Action Plan that:

• Prioritizes fixing the most dangerous streets and intersections
• Adopts a street maintenance policy that prioritizes pedestrian safety
• Eliminates turning conflicts, the most common cause of crashes
• Offers extra protection for the most vulnerable New Yorkers
• Criminalizes and prosecutes traffic fatalities

"The majority of New York City streets still lack safety improvements that have been proven to save lives," says Paul Steely White Executive Director of Transportation Alternatives. "This oversight hearing should serve as a wake-up call to the Mayor that all New Yorkers have a right to safe and sustainable mobility.

View this press release in PDF format