Vision Zero
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Gov. Baker Sends Traffic Safety Bill Back to Legislators With Objections to Safer Speed Limits and Passing Rules
The Governor proposed several amendments, including a simpler 3-foot minimum distance for motor vehicles passing bikes and pedestrians, and striking language that would let cities and towns reduce speed limits to 25 mph on state-owned roadways, including the Department of Conservation and Recreation's dangerous "parkways."
September 26, 2022
State Data Show Uber and Lyft Drivers Were Involved in Over 1,000 Crashes in the City of Boston Last Year
A state compilation of Uber and Lyft data from 2021 data indicates that those companies' drivers were involved in 2,267 crashes across Massachusetts last year. Nearly half of those crashes – 1,098 – occurred in the City of Boston.
September 20, 2022
Legislature Approves Long-Stalled Traffic Safety Bill With Compromises on Bike Light Requirements
The version of the legislation which passed both the House and Senate this week includes a compromise: the new lighting rules can’t be the primary purpose for a police stop, and can’t be used as conclusive evidence of contributory negligence in a civil suit.
September 16, 2022
Somerville to Build Protected Bike Lanes Near Davis Square After Fatal ‘Dooring’ Crash
Holland Street is scheduled to be repaved this fall; until this week, the project would have created a single paint-only bike lane next to parked cars, similar to the street layout on nearby Broadway.
September 2, 2022
Driving is the New Smoking: Lessons From America’s Public Health Victory Over Tobacco
Smoking, once a celebrated totem of American culture, is increasingly an ostracized habit of the marginal few. Getting there, though, took deliberate vision, coordinated efforts, and persistent policy trial and error over decades — and those efforts reveal a partial roadmap for breaking our country’s similarly dangerous addiction to cars.
September 2, 2022
Protected Intersection Could Bridge Critical Bike Network Gap on the Fenway
A city spokesperson tells StreetsblogMASS that there are "plans to have a two-way cycle track on the south side of the Muddy River crossing (Brookline Avenue between Park Drive and Fenway), as well as a two-way cycle track connecting north along Park Drive to the Fenway Path through the Landmark Center site."
August 29, 2022
Mayor Pledges ‘Immediate’ Action After Somerville Resident Killed In Door-Zone Bike Lane
Somerville police believe that the victim, identified as Stephen Conley, 70, of Somerville, was traveling westbound in the painted bike lane on Broadway when a driver in the adjacent parking lane opened the door of his Land Rover into Conley’s path.
August 16, 2022
Deference to Car Traffic Compromises Key Missing Link in Boston’s Bike Network
When it comes to designing safer streets to make that future a reality, the city is binding itself with assumptions that it won’t actually meet its climate goals, and sacrificing public space that could otherwise be dedicated to bus lanes or protected bike lanes in order to accommodate pre-pandemic volumes of motor vehicle traffic.
August 1, 2022
Truck Driver Kills Cambridge Man Next to Symphony Hall in Boston
Massachusetts Avenue, a major north-south bike route between Cambridge, Back Bay, the South End, and Dorchester, features a paint-only bike lane at the site of the crash.
July 14, 2022
Guest Column: What if We Held Transit and Traffic to the Same Safety Standards?
Editor's note: this piece originally appeared in Greater Greater Washington and is being reprinted here with permission.
July 6, 2022
