What: Rally for Pedestrian Safety

When: Sunday, March 4th, 3pm

Where: City Hall

New Yorkers obeying the law, crossing in crosswalks with the light and aware and attentive to their surroundings have been run down and killed by motor vehicles with horrifying regularity in 2007.

What’s more, many of the locations 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.

Community groups and activists have long pointed to these streets and intersections and asked for common-sense life saving improvements. On Sunday, March 4th they will stand together and demand a Pedestrian Safety Action Plan

Pedestrian Safety Action Plan

There must be 2000 fewer pedestrian injuries and fatalities on New York City’s Streets by 2009

If killing a pedestrian with a car were a crime, it would displace attacks with sharp or blunt objects as the second most common kind of homicide in New York City.

Mayor Bloomberg has taken bold steps to combat transfats, smoking and gun violence. More than 10,000 pedestrians were injured on NYC streets in 2005 and 159 were killed. The vast majority of these deaths were preventable.

There must be 2000 fewer annual pedestrian injuries and fatalities on New York City’s Streets by 2009, as compared to 2005.

His Honor needs to address this epidemic with the following measures:

• Prioritize Fixing the Most Dangerous Streets and Intersections
  • Pedestrians are being hit in the same locations again and again. Just 10% of the City’s intersections account for over 50% of all fatalities and injuries. These must be fixed immediately.
  • Prioritize fixes of the most dangerous streets in each Borough: Corridors like Roosevelt Avenue, the Grand Concourse, Flatbush Avenues, Canal Street and Hylan Boulevard are terrifying places to walk and must be made safe.
  • Complete the build out of Brooklyn’s Downtown Traffic Calming project by the summer of 2008 and design and do the same in at least one location in each remaining borough by 2009.

• Adopt a Street Maintenance Policy that Prioritizes Pedestrian Safety Measures
  • Every year, the City reconstructs 90 miles of roadway. The strongest pedestrian safety and traffic calming measures must be included within this work as a matter of course. Build for walking safety by adding sidewalk extensions, medians, raised crosswalks and other pedestrian safety measures as an automatic improvement of newly rebuilt city streets.
  • Gather and publish up to date information on all modes of travel in all neighborhoods to facilitate and inform community planning and neighborhood recommendations about pedestrian safety.

• Eliminate turning conflicts
  • Leading Pedestrian Intervals at all signalized intersections where a pedestrian has been hit by a turning vehicle in the last year.
  • Barnes dances at intersections with pedestrian volumes over 3000per hour and vehicle volumes over 4000 per hour on both approaches.

• Extra protection for the Most Vulnerable New Yorkers
  • Accelerate Safe Routes to School and expand to all NYC schools by 2009
  • Adopt a citywide program that brings pedestrian specific engineering improvements to areas with high concentrations of senior citizens.
  • Make Americans with Disabilities Act compliance a priority for all streets.

• Criminalize and prosecute traffic fatalities
  • Establish a more rigorous investigation process that facilitates prosecution of motorists that kill pedestrians.
  • Convene a task force of City and State authorities focused on strengthening laws against killer drivers.
  • Publish a multi-agency study of pedestrian fatalities and serious injuries since 1995.