When the city rolled out Vision Zero a decade ago, the landmark transportation safety initiative was so named because the goal was to bring the death toll from traffic collisions down to nothing.
A decade later, we are nowhere close to zero.
An analysis of NYPD data, which advocacy groups Transportation Alternatives and Families for Safe Streets released Tuesday, shows that 127 people died in traffic crashes on New York City’s streets in the first six months of this year. That’s the highest six-month total in the Vision Zero era.
The death toll includes 61 pedestrians and 12 cyclists struck and killed by drivers. That’s respectively 15% and 20% higher than the Vision Zero-era average, according to the analysis.
Over the past 10 years, the city has spent great resources changing traffic patterns, building out the bike lane network, correcting safety risks, adding speed bumps and even reducing speed limits. Why isn’t this working to reduce the death toll?
Part of the reason is undoubtedly the increased street congestion in the city. More cars are on the streets in the post-pandemic era; more volume means more risk to the public.
Nowhere is this more evident than in Midtown Manhattan; the analysis found the community had the highest rate of traffic collisions in the Five Boroughs. How congested are the streets there? Just last month, average speeds in Midtown dropped below 7 mph; by contrast, the common domestic mouse moves at an average speed of 8 mph.
If only there were some plan in place to reduce the amount of congestion in Manhattan — perhaps by charging drivers a toll to enter the neighborhoods where traffic has been particularly awful.
Oh, wait a minute… there is a plan! It’s called congestion pricing. And the only person standing in its way is Gov. Kathy Hochul.
After putting congestion pricing on indefinite pause last month, citing the need to save New Yorkers money after championing the plan for years, Hochul has not yet produced an iron-clad alternative funding program for the MTA’s capital improvements. She has also yet to explain how the state aims to reduce traffic in Midtown Manhattan — the other, but often forgotten, intended goal of congestion pricing.
People do not just die in speed-related street collisions. Other mishaps involving defenseless people and vehicles that way more than a ton result in serious injury, even death. The more cars that are on the street, the greater the odds a pedestrian, a bicyclist, or even another driver, is at risk of being in the wrong place at the wrong time — and paying with their lives.
Would that Governor Hochul could see that this is more than about dollars and cents. Congestion pricing is about common sense, and saving lives. If New York wants to have safer streets tomorrow, then Hochul should turn the tolls on today.
