Thank you for holding this hearing. I am campaign coordinator for Transportation Alternatives, a 4,500 member New York City citizens group that works to improve conditions for cycling and walking. I also coordinate a coalition called the Neighborhood Streets Network. The Network is made up of 35 block associations, PTAs and civic groups, all of whom believe that the negative effects of traffic are harming our quality of life and leading to unecessary danger. I've distributed copies material about the Network.

Cars kill and injure an enormous number of New York pedestrians and cyclists every year. A simple statistic shows the magnitude of the problem--in 1993, New Yorkers were more likely to be killed as a pedestrian than they were by being shot by someone they didn't know. Yet, where concentrated effort by the government has halved the murder rate, pedestrian safety is hardly on the radar screen. Almost every day a pedestrian is killed by a car in New York and 35 a day are sent to the hospital. It's worse for children and seniors. Getting hit by a car is the number one cause of death and injury for New York children ages 5-14.

It doesn't have to be this way. For the most part, the tools to drastically cut injuries and fatalities exist. In London, a world-class city of similar size, population and density, a concerted effort of traffic calming and police enforcement has seen a steady decline in deaths and injuries since 1986. In 1994, more than twice as many pedestrians were killed in New York than in London. London has also aggressively used traffic calming to protect residential quality of life and improve retail conditions.

The traffic calming and enforcement tools used in London have been used across the United States and the world, with much the same result. Traffic calming is all about redesigning streets so that drivers are encouraged to slow down, so that pedestrians, drivers and cyclists all have an equal right to the road. It involves techniques like speed humps, chicanes (bends in traffic direction), corner sidewalk extensions, mini traffic circles in residential neighborhoods and street direction changes on an neighborhood-wide basis. I have numerous examples of how traffic calming has been used, and would be happy to go over them with anyone here. Suffice it to say that traffic calming can lead to reductions in death and injury of more than 90 percent.

The funds for a massive pedestrian safety program also exist. Jon Orcutt of the Tri-State Transportation Campaign will speak about how federal safety funds are distributed out of context to the actual risks faced on our streets. New York City has several million dollars from the Federal CMAQ fund to spend on pedestrian safety and traffic calming. And, traffic calming can often be installed as part of other construction projects, like street reconstructions. So, the good news is that the State shouldn't have to spend more money to get fewer deaths and more livable communities.

It does, however need to change the law to favor pedestrians and traffic calming. I intend to submit testimony next week that will further document existing conditions and describe solutions in more depth. However, I'd like to outline five bills that would make it much easier to address the pedestrian safety and neighborhood quality-of-life problems.

1. The solutions for pedestrian safety and neighborhood traffic problems must come from the lowest levels of government. Thus, localities should be allowed discretion in local roadway design and regulation. In particular, they should be allowed to set speed limits below 25 mph. State law currently prohibits this.

2. Expenditure of federal Istea safety spending bears no connection to the actual risks faced by New Yorkers. The legislature should require State DOT to establish a formula that divides federal ISTEA safety funds based upon deaths and injuries received per mode.

3. Establish absolute pedestrian right-of-way and the right of localities to establish traffic calmed zones. Pedestrians are soft, cars hard. Pedestrians should always have the right of way.

4. Unlicensed driving is a recurring problem. If unlicensed driving and driving with a suspended license carries no penalty, then how can we expect our police to take the task of writing traffic tickets seriously? Why should we be surprised when an unlicensed person kills a pedestrian, and is not charged with a crime. The legislature needs to make it so that if someone kills or injures while driving without a license, or with a suspended license, the intent to injure is assumed and thus they are charged with a felony.

5. Speed kills. But the police do not have the resources to do regular enforcement. A technology similar to red light cameras, Photo Radar, exists and is in use in several other cities. It allows one officer to issue tickets as fast os once every one-half second, thus extending blanket coverage on roadways where before the police could only stop drivers that are vastly exceeding the speed limit. Small increases in speed matter: Someone hit by a car going thirty miles an hour has a 40 percent chance of death. At forty, the chance rises to 70 percent. The legislature should authorize a pilot installation of Photo Radar, as it did with red light cameras. Like the red light program, photo radar pays for itself.

These changes are common sense and are supported by PTA, Neighborhood and other civic groups across the city. I'm sure that if you held similar hearings in other New York cities, the feeling would be the same.

Again, I'd like to thank you for holding this hearing and we look forward to offering any assistance towards passing these bills.