Vision Zero Plan Aims To Eliminate Traffic Deaths

The Sacramento City Council Tuesday night will vote on whether to create a task force to reduce the number of traffic deaths in the city.

From 2010 to 2014, 130 people were killed in traffic incidents in Sacramento, including 13 bicyclists and 48 pedestrians.

"I really don't feel safe as a pedestrian, especially if I'm trying to cross the street," says Kirin Kumar with the pedestrian advocacy group Walk Sacramento.

Kumar says he feels most vulnerable, not in downtown or midtown, but on major thoroughfares in urban areas such as 47th Avenue, Stockton Boulevard and Fruitridge Road.

"It's just the focus on moving vehicles as quickly as we can on some of those streets really doesn't make it a place for pedestrian and bicycle activity," says Kumar.

Hector Barron is a traffic engineer with the city's Department of Public Works. He says council members will consider a motion directing the City Manager to develop a Vision Zero Action Plan, meaning zero deaths. That would likely mean creating a task force to look at policies.

"One is education," says Barron, "try to develop an outreach plan to educate the public about traffic safety. Then also on the enforcement side and look at our enforcement to see if there are things that we need to be doing a little bit differently."

He says another area would be road engineering, or designing roads that would be equally safe for drivers, bicycles and pedestrians.