Safe Streets

Author: Rachel Liu | Category: Education | Environment | Date: 08-12-2020

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Imagine being able to walk through the streets of a city instead of being forced to take a cab, car, or public transportation because the streets were too crowded or unsafe for you to walk in. Safe streets (also known as open streets, cyclovia, cycleways, and street eats) aim to make cities more walkable and accommodating for pedestrians and bikers by making the streets more safe. Therefore, there are increased opportunities for recreation while physical distancing, which is extremely important to this COVID-19 and post-COVID-19 world. In San Francisco, this is part of Vision Zero, an initiative to prioritize street safety and eliminate traffic deaths in the city. Sierra Club also promotes the program “green walkable streets - slow streets” and it is one of the main programs in the Loma Prieta chapter. This initiative would also empower seniors and people with disabilities to access cities. 

According to SFPD, 64% of all collisions between people walking and cars were due to motorists failing to yield to pedestrians. Moreover, seniors are five times more likely to be killed in traffic and make up at least 50% of all pedestrians killed each year, even though they are only 15% of San Francisco’s population. These statistics reveal an obvious problem that needs to be solved. 

San Francisco’s safe streets campaign was started by San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA), and its campaign focuses on grassroots outreach efforts through street teams and outreach training to community-based organizations. Through SFMTA increasing and bettering the public relations and press coverage regarding pedestrian safety through freeways bulletins, wallboards and posters, ads, etc, the public is able to learn more about this pressing issue. Additionally, the Sierra Club is currently working with officials of some cities in the San Mateo and Santa Clara counties to promote their program of green walkable streets through safe streets. The city of San Mateo is an example of a city that is working on building safer streets, which would be implemented into long-term policy and will meet many of the goals in the city’s climate action plans. 

Safe streets would benefit the environment in numerous ways. The transportation sector generates the largest share of greenhouse gas emissions in the United States; in 2018, transportation made up 28.2% of the US’ overall greenhouse gas emissions. Instead of having to use cars, safe streets allow pedestrians to feel safer when walking on the streets of cities. When city residents are more encouraged to walk through the implementation of these safer streets, there are fewer emissions from transportation. Ultimately, walking is the best way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Sources: 

sierraclub.org/sites/www.sierraclub.org/files/sce/loma-prieta-chapter/SLU/Policy%20-Green%20Streets%20-%20Sierra%20Club.pdf

https://www.sfmta.com/getting-around/safety/safety-education-campaigns/safe-streets-campaign

https://www.epa.gov/greenvehicles/fast-facts-transportation-greenhouse-gas-emissions

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About: Rachel Liu

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Comment:

Gladwyn d'Souza
Good summary of the efforts underway for Safe Streets and the linkage to Vision Zero. I like what Oakland did. We should advocate for all our cities and San Mateo County to implement Safe Streets and Vision Zero. Oakland took their entire bike network, 74 miles, and converted it what they call Slow ...Read more Streets, so that their citizens could safely social distance while traveling. https://www.oaklandca.gov/projects/oakland-slow-streets "Slow Streets with and without soft closure barriers are Closed to Through Traffic so that people can more comfortably use these low-traffic streets for physically distant walking, wheelchair rolling, jogging, and biking all across the City." Less
Zoe Byun
Nice article, Rachel! Thank you for writing about the topic of safe streets, I definitely think that it is an important issue that needs to be talked more about.
Vanessa Teo
This was a very informative article Rachel! I learned a lot and this was definitely very eye-opening; I'm looking forward to reading a lot more of your articles!
Victoria Lin
Great article Rachel! The statistic of how the elderly population is 15% of Sf, yet 50% of the total deaths due to unsafe streets really stuck me. I have a lot of family living in San Francisco, so this is definitely always a worry of mine.

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