A 17 year old cyclist riding on the sidewalk along Old Georgetown Road fell off his bike and into the road yesterday. He was struck and died. This incident, in addition to being a tragedy, also exemplifies why Vision Zero is needed.
Barring some new facts about the driver, this will likely be chalked up as "human error" on the part of the cyclist, but in reality, the errors came in design of the road long before the crash occurred. And the idea of VZ is that the burden of avoid fatalities should rest on the shoulders of those who design and built the system, not those who use it.
Old Georgetown Road is a 7-lane road with narrow sidewalks, no bike facilities and no shoulders. And the sidewalk is further narrowed by no parking signs, foliage, dirt and, yesterday, trash set outside for pickup. All with the added obstacle of a driveway curb cut. [I believe this is the spot where the crash occurred and you can see the steep sidewalk angle and the no parking sign right there together.] The victim was likely not helped by the fact that the driver was in an SUV instead of a sedan (this is another choice).
This was the first bicycle fatality in the area since Dave Salovesh's and the first in Montgomery County since Jaimie Caceres in November.
This road is not someplace where cyclists should be unexpected. Just a few blocks farther south, the North Bethesda Trolley Trail runs along side Old Georgetown and this crash occurred just outside a school zone. Furthermore, the County's new bike plan recommends a side path on this section. As it is now though, it's wholly inadequate.
Montgomery County committed to Vision Zero in 2017 and is ending it's first two-year action plan this year. The goal was to cut traffic deaths by 35% this year and to zero by 2030. I'm not sure how well they're doing thus far, maybe someone else does.
Prince George's county recently became the latest jurisdiction to commit to Vision Zero. They haven't put their plan together yet, but last I saw the goal was to cut fatalities by 50% by 2030 and to zero by 2040. Of course, the state of Maryland just set a goal of zero by 2030, so that seems to be in conflict. For reference, DC's is by 2024 and Alexandria and Arlington are aiming for 2028. I don't think Virginia has a Vision Zero goal.
Yesterday I was on Kojo to talk about Vision Zero and while it was encouraging to have the county (where I probably do half or more of my biking) make the commitment to Vision Zero, there were other things that were not encouraging. Prince George’s County’s Director of Public Works and Transportation Terry Bellamy still talked about human error as the cause of crashes instead of design issues. He made it sound as though Vision Zero is just a rebranding of the efforts they were already doing, the ones that make PG County the highest road fatality county in the state (by numbers, not rate). He also said that "Distractive walking is just as bad as distractive driving" which I'm willing to be generous and assume was just clumsy statement not that he sees them as equivalent.
It's crashes like yesterday's that shows how bad design is such a large part of the problem, and how far we have to go. Local and state governments are committing to fixing these problems and making our roads safe, and time will tell if they have the backbone for it, but so far there are as many reasons to be discouraged as encouraged.
State of Maryland thinks putting "Bikes May Use Full Lane" equals creating biking infrastructure. And, it's so cheap!
I have been fed up for decades now with the way local government treats the concerns of pedestrians and cyclists (letters and emails to engineers or whoever is supposed to be on the front line of responding to citizens' concerns) are always answered with boilerplate crap like "We have to balance the needs of motorists and cyclists," meaning, motorists come first.
Vision Zero so far as I can see means Zero Vision, just lip service.
I am so, so sorry for Jacob's family, friends and community.
Posted by: Nancy | August 01, 2019 at 07:49 PM
It is worth noting that this is the 2nd bicyclist killed in #MoCo since 2016 who while riding on the sidewalk, tried to avoid an obstacle, fell into the road, and was killed. Takeaways 1) We need more sidewalks but they are clearly NOT a substitute for separated bike lanes 2) #MoCo says "Don't block traffic, sidewalks, or mailboxes with containers." 3) OGR has AMPLE space for separated bike lanes
Posted by: David Helms | August 03, 2019 at 10:22 AM
June 2, 2016: "Authorities identified the bicyclist as Santos Escobar-Villatoro, of the 100 block of North Summit Avenue in Gaithersburg. He succumbed to his injuries at the scene.
Police said the teen was riding his bicycle on a sidewalk in Gaithersburg ... investigators believe the 16-year-old fell from his bicycle and landed into oncoming traffic just before the collision."
https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/public-safety/md-teen-dies-after-falling-off-bicycle-and-being-struck-by-vehicle/2016/06/02/2aade814-290b-11e6-b989-4e5479715b54_story.html?utm_term=.a459f161a69d
Posted by: David Helms | August 03, 2019 at 10:24 AM
Implementing #VisionZero is about having complete streets and safe systems, roads,bike infrastructure & side walks, to lower risk for everyone. We need to look at all the engineering and human behavior facts that result deaths. Most importantly, we need to learn from crashes to eliminate risk factors. I hope #MoCo learns the lesson that keeping the sidewalks clear is a public safety issue. https://www.montgomerycountymd.gov/sws/trash/service-details.html
Posted by: David Helms | August 03, 2019 at 10:34 AM
A young cyclist was injured on this road a few years back by a turning driver. This heavily used road really, really needs better cycling infra.
Posted by: Crickey | August 12, 2019 at 03:07 PM