On September 19th, in the city of San Mateo, a dad and his two small kids were crossing Franklin Parkway in the Bay Meadows neighborhood. They were in a crosswalk with the blinking crosswalk signal passing in front of a stopped car, when a second car barreled through the other lane striking a child’s scooter causing her to fall to the ground. In the lane next to the collision, the stopped driver’s dashcam caught the harrowing incident on camera.

Franklin Parkway is a divided 4-lane street through a Transit-Oriented Development. This crosswalk is brightly painted and has flashing lights on signs you can activate before crossing. This parent, and anyone else crossing here, is lulled into a sense of safety by this state-of-the-art crosswalk. But, in this direction of traffic, drivers go around a bend before the crosswalk is visible. And the wide street with 2 lanes of traffic invite speeding, making the crosswalk and flashing signs nearly invisible until too late.

We applaud the reaction from the City of San Mateo! The City reacted by putting in a quick-build project using cones and an electronic sign to close one lane of southwest-bound traffic. Reducing the lanes of traffic, naturally slows drivers down and prevents a one-lane stopped, one-lane going scenario. The city then replaced the cones with posts. We appreciate the City changing the design of the intersection!

At the same time, the San Mateo Police Department increased their enforcement operations at certain intersections known to be problematic for crosswalk violations. As of October 7th, the operation has resulted in 60 citations.

What’s Next? Many on social media blamed the parent in the video for being distracted. This reaction is a problem as it allows us to dismiss the incident without looking for other solutions. The driver also made mistakes (speeding and failing to stop at the crosswalk when the other lane is stopped). But the real problem is assuming we can remove human error from our streets.

This crosswalk is built with all the newest safety features, but it still isn’t safe for people outside of cars. This family was using the crosswalk as designed. But even if they weren’t, people will inevitably make mistakes – both inside the car and outside of it. It is our job to demand our streets are designed so that those mistakes don’t risk death and this is point of Vision Zero.

Graphic from Vision Zero Network
See SVBC’s Vision Zero Tool Kit here

We applaud the quick action by the City of San Mateo, but do we need to have a video of a crash involving a child on each unsafe street to make lasting changes in our communities? For example, the street that we live on is a wide residential street with parking on both sides. Cut-through drivers speed down streets, oblivious to our children running in our yard, on the sidewalk, and around parked cars. Getting simple traffic calming measures implemented like a speed hump or even a DIY narrowing of the street with planters should be fairly easy, right? You’d think so. But, the hurdles to get traffic calming on a street are too high — just check out this 33 page treatise on getting traffic calming on your street in San Mateo. Will it take another child being in a video like this for the City to make this easier?

Frustration over the slowness with which we’re seeing change is happening all over our city. As reported by The Daily Journal, the parent in the Franklin Parkway video is asking for a permanent stop sign or traffic light at the intersection as there are many homes nearby and children use the crosswalk on their way to schools. The City responded that a study needs to be done before permanent changes to the intersection can be made.

Why do we need to study how changes would affect car traffic? Rather we should be prioritizing installing things we already know are safer for people regardless of whether it slows down drivers. Plus, isn’t slowing down cars the point? We must put the safety of the most vulnerable road users before moving cars quickly through our cities. And we need to put our money where our mouths are.

Funding Vision Zero!

This San Mateo incident shows cities can move quickly if motivated. But we need to change reaction to preemptive action. This starts with clear city-wide prioritization of Vision Zero.

Most cities in the Bay Area have adopted a Vision Zero policy, like the city of San Mateo did through its Sustainable Streets Plan in 2015. However, San Mateo, like many other Peninsula cities, does not have dedicated funding or an action plan to achieve Vision Zero. Let’s change that! Urge your city council to make Vision Zero a priority - dedicate funding and give staff the resources so that such incidents never happen again. Afterall re-design of streets is less expensive than on-going traffic enforcement and less susceptible to inequitable implementation. If you’re curious about your city’s Vision Zero efforts, check out the status of Vision Zero in your city.

Learn what you could do to lead a campaign in your city by watching the recording of our October 4, 2022 community organizing workshop. In the workshop, SVBC describes its campaign in San José to get the City to implement their Vision Zero Action Plan in the next two years. We must urge all of our cities to implement their Vision Zero plans and policies NOW to make our streets safer.

Join a local team and start advocating!