L.A. and N.Y.

John Callahan

Vision Zero: Dumb and dishonest

Photo: Scott Heins

One of the big problems with Vision Zero---aside from the fact that it's a slogan, not a realistic safety policy---is that it makes people seem a lot dumber than they really are.

The latest evidence of that is a story in yesterday's NY Times (More People Are Dying on New York City’s Streets. What Went Wrong?).

Basing a traffic safety policy on wishful thinking is what went wrong, especially with the push by many cities to get more people to ride bikes:

Promisingly, the number of traffic deaths in New York City had dropped in recent years. Then suddenly, they rose in the past year to 219, from 203 deaths in 2018, according to preliminary data from the city. There were 28 cyclist deaths in 2019, the highest level in two decades and more than double the number in the previous year.

More cyclists are being killed in New York because more people are riding bikes there:

Cyclists have called on the police to more aggressively enforce traffic laws and city officials to install more protected bike lanes that are physically separated from traffic. Biking has become increasingly popular in New York City — the number of daily bike trips has nearly doubled, to 490,000 trips in 2017 from 250,000 in 2010.

...Cyclists regularly post photos online of treacherous routes and police cars and other vehicles blocking bike lanes. “It’s been a particularly difficult year, especially for New Yorkers who bike,” said Joe Cutrufo, a spokesman for Transportation Alternatives, a group that promotes cycling. “Most of the people killed while biking in 2019 would still be alive if there had been a protected — and unobstructed — bike lane available.”

They would all be alive if they hadn't been riding a bike, which has intrinsic dangers that promoters of cycling are in denial about. City governments want to get people on bikes because it's not only the PC thing to do but because it helps cities mitigate traffic congestion.

It's simply irresponsible to encourage people to ride bikes as if it's a green, win-win deal for everyone without also providing a realistic sense of the dangers. San Francisco even encourages parents to get their children to ride bikes on city streets!

Like most cities, the only way to make protected bike lanes---or unprotected bike lanes, for that matter---in New York City is by taking away a traffic lane or street parking, a politically difficult trade-off where motor vehicles are the favored means of transportation.

More from the story:

The troubling statistics have raised doubts about Mayor Bill de Blasio’s signature plan to improve street safety and prompted the City Council to embrace an ambitious effort to add 250 miles of protected bike lanes to “break the car culture.”

Mayor de Blasio personifies the limousine liberal concept. Does he ride a bike in New York City? Har har:

Though he or she might prefer Uber rather than an actual limo, a limousine liberal is generally someone who espouses a brand of politics that doesn’t quite match up with his or her tax returns and actions. Mayor Bill de Blasio, with his police-chauffeured SUV rides from Gracie Mansion to his Park Slope gym, is a limousine liberal. He tells tales of two cities, but it’s getting harder for New Yorkers to believe he’s in touch with theirs.

The Vision Zero bullshit originated in Sweden. How is Sweden doing in eliminating traffic fatalities? Not very well, as it turns out:

“Vision Zero” emerged as a strategy to navigate the conflicting demands of valuing individuals’ lives and the desire to improve accessibility to car traffic, and the traffic safety campaign was launched by the Swedish government in 1997 with the novel goal of reducing the number of road deaths to zero. In Sweden, the campaign has been very successful in achieving its narrowly defined goals, and in its first 20 years, the number of people killed in traffic mishaps each year halved from 541 in 1997 to last year’s 270.

I'm not too good at math, but 270 is a long way from zero.

By the way, the assumption behind the Vision Zero slogan is that motor vehicles are the biggest threat to cyclists on city streets. In fact the most common cycling accident is the "solo fall" that has nothing to do with other vehicles. See The myth of cycling "collisions" and The UC Study, "cyclist-only" accidents, and infrastructure.

See also The irresponsible bike hype and Vision Zero in Los Angeles and San Francisco.