We can save lives with proven traffic safety measures. Email Mayor Todd Gloria and the City Council to demand safer street designs that will save lives.
2021 was the deadliest year in over a decade on the roads of San Diego. In the span of twelve months, 109 people were killed in traffic crashes. Tragically, the most vulnerable road users have suffered most from the epidemic of traffic crashes: since 2012, the number of cyclists and pedestrians killed in San Diego County each year has nearly doubled, from 33 to 52. Each of these victims had friends, family and loved ones. Their lives mattered.
None of these fatal crashes were coincidences. While countries like Germany, the UK, and Japan have used proven traffic safety measures to reduce fatalities to the lowest levels seen in over 50 years, U.S. traffic deaths hit a ten-year high last year. You’re now more than three times as likely to die in a crash here than you would be in any of our peer countries.
We know which traffic safety strategies are proven to save lives. Now we just need our leaders to gain the courage to implement them. We’re asking Mayor Todd Gloria and the San Diego City Council to commit to three life saving actions next year.
- Double the funding for San Diego’s quick-build bikeways program, so they can build eighteen miles of life-saving separated bikeways per year. Separated bikeways are proven to reduce serious crashes by over 80%. We should be installing them on every urban road with speed limits 30 mph or above, and this program will let San Diego do that as quickly as possible.
- Upgrade fifteen of San Diego’s most deadly intersections with lead pedestrian intervals, high-visibility crosswalks, and other lifesaving safety measures. The first strategy in San Diego’s campaign to stop traffic fatalities– Vision Zero– is to make traffic signal and crosswalk improvements to San Diego’s most dangerous intersections. However, over one hundred identified dangerous intersections have still not received safer crosswalks and traffic signals. Mayor Todd Gloria’s administration needs to speed up the pace of installing these lifesaving safety measures.
- Complete a Bicycle Master Plan update with strict deadlines for implementation by the end of 2023. San Diego’s bicycle master plan has not been updated since 2013, when safe, protected bikeways were not even considered an option. This plan needs to be updated to include protected bikeways on all of San Diego’s high-speed or high-volume roads, and it needs to come with strict deadlines that will hold the City accountable for actually building the bikeways that it plans.
Even better: Send your own personalized email to Mayor Todd Gloria and the San Diego City Council.
Please copy and paste the following recipients, and BCC will@sdbikecoalition.org:
MayorToddGloria@sandiego.gov, joelacava@sandiego.gov, jennifercampbell@sandiego.gov, StephenWhitburn@sandiego.gov, mmontgomerysteppe@sandiego.gov, kflee@sandiego.gov, MarnivonWilpert@sandiego.gov, RaulCampillo@sandiego.gov, vivianmoreno@sandiego.gov, SeanEloRivera@sandiego.gov
Here’s a template you can copy and paste directly into your email:
Dear Mayor Gloria and City Council,
My name is ___ and I am a resident of _____
I’m writing to ask you to dedicate more funding to life-saving traffic safety programs in the Fiscal Year 2024 Budget. 109 people were killed in traffic crashes in 2021 within the City of San Diego– the most in over ten years. Each of these victims had friends, family, and loved ones. Their lives mattered.
None of these deaths were coincidences. While countries like Germany, the UK, and Japan have used proven traffic safety measures to reduce fatalities to the lowest levels seen in over 50 years, U.S. traffic deaths hit a ten-year high last year. You’re now more than three times as likely to die in a crash here than you would be in any of our peer countries. Even within California, San Diego is especially dangerous– in 2021, we had the highest bicycle fatality rate of any urban county in the state.
We know that traffic safety measures like protected bike lanes, traffic signal improvements, and high-visibility crosswalks have the power to save lives. Some of the 109 people who were killed in traffic crashes last year could be alive today if our leaders had the courage and vision to invest more aggressively in these traffic safety improvements.
As a San Diego resident myself, I’m terrified that I could lose one of my loved ones because of the systematically unsafe conditions on our streets. I strongly urge you to invest in traffic safety measures that will save lives.
Specifically, I urge you to commit to the following three actions:
1. Double the funding for San Diego’s quick-build bikeways program, so they can build eighteen miles of life-saving separated bikeways per year.
2. Upgrade fifteen of San Diego’s most deadly intersections with lead pedestrian intervals, high-visibility crosswalks and other lifesaving safety measures in Fiscal Year 2024
3. Complete a Bicycle Master Plan update with strict deadlines for implementation by the end of 2023.
Thank you for taking the time to consider my input. Traffic safety is a life-or-death issue for me and my family, and I urge you to make it a priority.
Sincerely,
_____
