Charles Allen on Kojo on Friday

Martin Austermuhle filled in for Kojo Nnamdi on Friday with guests Tom Sherwood and Councilmember Charles Allen. This was the same day as the Rally for Streets that Don't Kill People and so the subject of Vision Zero and safer streets came up. 

AUSTERMUHLET Do you think the city is moving aggressively enough to protect non-motorized users of the roadways?

ALLEN: Easy answer on that is no. We are not doing enough. We're not doing it fast enough, and we're not treating it with the urgency that it requires. We had 36 people that were killed last year on our roadways. We've had eight thus far this year. You know, I also do expand that out, about why you bring urgency. We've had over 50 people killed in homicides this year. We've had dozens of people die from opioid overdoses this year. Every one of those lives is tragic. Every one of those needs to be valued. And we need to, as a city, have a response with the urgency that is requires. So, this is why I have -- on all those other fronts, I continue to push, and on this one, I'm going to continue to push, as well. We're not doing enough, period.

SHERWOOD: Well, in the case of David Salovesh, he was killed, he was on Florida Avenue Northeast, near 12th and Florida. A stolen van crashed into...

ALLEN: That'll be a driver of a van. The van didn't drive itself.

SHERWOOD: A driver of a van, a 25-year-old driver of the van crushed him up against a tree. But I went back and looked at this, and just a block away from there -- and I was there at the Ghost Bikes ceremony over the weekend. There's lots of calls, like today. But I went back and looked at the record, and you've said your legislation is to push faster to get Florida Avenue -- which can be a six-lane speedway, in some places -- get more work done there. But I went back to Ruby Whitfield, who, roughly six years ago a block away was leaving her church, and she gets struck and killed, and nothing was done. The church members there had all the same kind of outrage and outpouring that we're having now. And I'm just wondering, I think -- were you probably chairman -- you were chief of staff to Tommy Wells in 2013?

ALLEN: At the time, yeah, when Ms. Whitfield was killed, she was crossing in the crosswalk, coming home from church. And the city did move and put up essentially what's called a hawk signal, so put up a lighted crosswalk....but it doesn't do anything about the design of the street. That, to me, is the fundamental (word?). Yes, a driver of a van is culpable for taking his vehicle up to over 60 miles an hour. But we also have a road that allows you to get to over 60 miles an hour. We've known that street is dangerous, and we haven't done anything about it. We've been spending ten years talking about a redesign of Florida Avenue, and we haven't done it yet. That's why I've pushed legislation to push for it.

There is more to the conversation that I've edited out (like an argument about whether or not the Hawk signal is still there. It is.), so go to the site if you want all of it. Later some one calls into to complain about Nazi bicyclists who take the lane just to clog up roads (the correct term is the Bike Reich, geez). 

ALLEN ...our roads have to be for everyone. We are so focused and we have built out so much around how you move around by car. There's going to be cars in the roadway, but our roadway is built for everyone, whether you are a pedestrian, whether you are on a bicycle, whether you are on a bus, whether you're on a scooter. Our roads have to be safe for every single user. And the way in which we have prioritized the convenience of the car over safety is, to me, the root of the problem. And, you know, a lot of these issues, I think, really sprung up -- when we talk about our region -- go back to 1950s and '60s, when we started building our freeways everywhere. We destroyed communities. But there's a reason why cars funnel in and pour through some neighborhoods, and others not. It is because we have built out our city in a way that is much more accommodating to the commuter than it is to the folks who live here. And when we talk about transit equity, look at the deaths last year on our roadways. A third of them are in Ward 8. So, this is an issue that cuts across the entire city.

Then Sherwood asked him about enforcement and how the police just let DDOT do that during rush hour. 

ALLEN...in less than two weeks, I'm going to be introducing some very big, bold Vision Zero legislation. And we'll speak to how our roadways must be redesigned for all users. It will also speak to how we can improve enforcement. At the end of the day....every decision has to be around: how do we provide a safer space for all users of our roadway?

Comments

[Richard B]

So, on these call in shows do you think that really noone else calls in with other opinions or do they purposefully make sure to let through angry drivers to perpetuate the "war on cars?"

On a different note, so I get my analogies straight, given that bikers are Nazis, does that mean that pedestrians are Italian Fascists, delivery truck drivers are Russian Commies, taxis are Vichy France, and people on the Metro are the Swiss? Where do the Japanese fit in are those scooter riders? I need to break out Axis and Allies to figure this out.

[James W]

I was so upset by this Kojo show - from the fact that it turned out to only be a short segment at the end of the hour after advertising this topic all morning, to then Austermuhle (isn't he a cyclist?) leading into the show by saying it's about trying to make the streets more "friendly" to cyclists. It was a horribly belittling way to approach the subject of dangerous drivers. I mean, people died, one person wasn't even on the street.

But then to have that single caller who was a driver complaining about being slowed in cutting through Rock Creek to Silver Spring because a cyclist is holding up traffic, really was over the top for this show. Even after this driver calls the cyclist a Nazi and says he should be ticketed for not using the bike path, there's basically no response from Austermuhle or Allen. Allen's roundabout statement that roads need to accommodate more that just drivers was totally inadequate. Where was the push-back against the notion that drivers are entitled to drive at the detriment of other's safety and fair use of the road? Allen made it sound like the solution to dangerous drivers is to direct some future resources to other road users leaving drivers as is. That statement came across as just a totally different topic. I do hope, though, that Allen keeps pushing the fact that Wards on the east side of town are those treated most unfairly with construction of enormous, fast roads that have destroyed neighborhoods.

[contrarian]

James, you should forward what you just wrote to Austermuhle and Kojo's producers. It's well-reasoned and sober. They need to hear it.