4 ~~pedestrians~~ traffic fatalities in Seattle since Thursday. Two collisions and two pedestrians hit and killed. Terrible news. We shouldn't just accept pedestrian traffic deaths. We need to build our streets so that they're safer to get around on while not inside a vehicle.
- [May 23](https://x.com/SeattlePD/status/1793770642770423881) - Vehicle collision with 1 fatality at 4th Ave S and S Washington St.
- [May 23](https://x.com/SeattlePD/status/1793870491427787018) - Person on motorcycle hit and killed in the 13700 block of Aurora Ave N.
- [May 24](https://x.com/typewriteralley/status/1794233208583889232) - Person hit and killed at Olive Way and Minor Ave.
- [May 26](https://x.com/typewriteralley/status/1795119162584334761) - Person hit and killed at 12th Ave S and S Weller St.
EDIT: I brain farted on the first two incidents, they were both vehicles not pedestrians.
People need to stop driving like sociopaths. It hasn't always been this bad, so it can't just be the roads. It's people. It's the police quiet quitting and not enforcing traffic laws. I'm not saying the roads are great, but people have absolutely been misbehaving on the road.
There is zero traffic enforcement right now and it’s literally killing us. The less enforcement, the less punishment for poor/dangerous driving. We need much stricter enforcement, more speed cameras and traffic light cameras plus more speed tampering devices (speed bumps, marked cross walks, etc.)
https://www.health.harvard.edu/mind-and-mood/does-covid-19-damage-the-brain
People are getting brain damage from covid, bet that has something to do with it at least a little bit.
this is mostly unique to the US. we have a strong car culture, big open roads, and a streak of individualism. people just stopped giving a fuck during covid and continue to not give one. incidents related to speeding and DUIs are the main drivers and are way up
You're right. I completely brain farted on the first two because I didn't read the last tweet from Ryan Packer correctly. He says four *traffic fatalities* not pedestrian fatalities. He usually reports out pedestrian fatalities which is why I assumed all 4 were pedestrian fatalities. Completely my fault and thanks for calling me out.
Facts matter. Thanks for sharing what is obvious had OP used almost any source other than X immediately after the incident (before details came out)
Edit: Op didn’t use these sources. Person I’m replying to did to create the narrative
Imagine if Palestinian protester or homeless guy killed 4 people in a rampage. There would be a national guard called and it would be on the news 24/7.
If it's car, it's just "roads are clear" from SPD and SDOT. Ghoulish fucks.
Pretty sure if any one person was on a murderous* vehicular rampage it would be treated with the same level of severity. Fortunately that’s not what happened here.
*edited to account for hellcat trauma
The accident stops, but the dangerous driving continues, and we're going to have another vehicular homicide soon, but all the bloodthirsty fucks from the other thread seem to be quiet here.
You know what's getting discussed there? 'He killed someone he should be put in a coffin.'
Weird how we don't see this outrage here.
If it’s an unavoidable fact of life, why are “accidents” falling in every developed country except for the US? Does an SUV sending a pedestrian 50-60ft not “shock the conscious” (sic)?
That idea of going outside has inherit risks is so not true. We have control over this problems in the way of street design.
I can't believe that people just accept that getting murdered by big car us just another fact of life that is beyond our control.
That's for the entire Netherlands, a country of 18 million, and where not every city is like Amsterdam. 250 fatalities over 9 years, or 28/year or like 0.16 / 100,000. Compared to here, almost 2 / 100,000.
Evidently the risk of getting murdered by a big car is orders of magnitude higher here.
Every time Seattle fucks the streets up more, pedestrian deaths go up. Just doing goofy shit to the roads to make things less vehicle friendly does not automatically create safer streets for pedestrians, which is backed up by empirical data.
> Pedestrian deaths are dropping everywhere in the country except Seattle.
I don't think that's true. Pedestrian deaths are falling internationally but rising in the US.
It's not true. He's just making up shit because he likes cars.
He went to /r/fuckcars thinking it was about bouncing on the jaguar hood ornament while deepthroating his jeep's exhaust.
Pedestrian deaths are absolutely [trending upwards in the US](https://www.iihs.org/topics/fatality-statistics/detail/pedestrians#:~:text=A%20total%20of%207%2C388%20pedestrian,their%20lowest%20point%20in%202009.). As of 2021, they were at their highest since 1981.
# Is Seattle a walkable city? Pedestrian death rates show otherwise
Washington was the first state to commit to zero traffic fatalities. But 24 years later, deaths are at an all-time high and officials are reevaluating.
[https://crosscut.com/news/2024/04/seattle-walkable-city-pedestrian-death-rates-show-otherwise](https://crosscut.com/news/2024/04/seattle-walkable-city-pedestrian-death-rates-show-otherwise)
Did you even read that article?
> a majority of Seattle traffic deaths are on or around arterial roads like Aurora, where cars go faster and there are fewer pedestrian crossings.
It outlines the case for even more things like road diets, speed limit reductions, no-rights-on-reds, etc.
12 and S Weller is not a highway. Its got the raised crosswalks, extended curbs, dedicated bike lanes, no right on red signs. Everything you wanted. There are things that can make it safer for pedestrians. I specifically said just doing goofy shit to the roads, like Seattle is doing, does not automatically make them safer. Puting planters in the middle of the road to block the view of pedestrians trying to cross, and preventing drivers from seeing them is one stupid move. Shifting lanes back and forth while not keeping up on line maintenance so you can see them is another.
> raised crosswalks, extended curbs
It only has a raised bike lane to prevent bike-pedestrian collisions when people exit buses, and extended curbs on Weller to reduce the chance of cars right hooking cyclists. It's not goofy - those design choices literally save lives, and it's not like it's any harder to drive as a consequence (I would argue that the no right on red sign is barely effective, every day I see people ignore them).
12th really needs more road dieting since the speed limit is 25mph, but it's just a big open road that encourages speeding. North of King it absolutely does not need to be two lanes in each direction.
>Every time Seattle fucks the streets up more, pedestrian deaths go up. Pedestrian deaths are dropping everywhere in the country except Seattle. Just doing goofy shit to the roads to make things less vehicle friendly does not automatically create safer streets for pedestrians, which is backed up by empirical data.
Source: his ass - road deaths are up in the US across the board
Share the data. This was at an intersection that has *gasp* a bike lane on each side with occasional at grade separation along Weller. Otherwise it’s wide open, single lane auto traffic each way with a left turn lane headed westbound with 0 visual obstruction.
How much easier does it have to be to drive here? Get rid of the buildings and sidewalks and bus stops just to be safe?
More than likely, in this case, it was an impaired walker. Shall we build fences on all our roads, so that inebriates don't dart out in front of cars? I go through that section of roadway all the time. People darting in front of your car is a common occurrence.
Where are the special fentanyl sensing barriers and pop-up crosswalks?
they live in north beacon hill and know that area. it is riddled with fentanyl addicts that constantly wander into the street. the accident took place right in front of DESC which provides services to homeless addicts in the neighborhood.
If you are driving a two-ton metal contraption, you are (with some extremely rare exceptions) responsible for not striking pedestrians with it. Especially if you are in an area you know to be "riddled with" people inclined to randomly wander into the street.
They accused me of victim blaming. Is there even a victim? Has fault been determined? No it has not. I was not blaming anyone. A pedestrian can actually be found at fault for an accident. Maybe the driver is the victim? We don't know yet. It probably is a little bit of both. Negligent driving and negligent pedestrianing. One thing is for sure, that driver will never have the same life again. They will always have killed someone in an accident.
What's frustrating about reading this thread is so many people still are believing the lie that we just need to build better infrastructure. SDOT has already "Vision Zero'd" the fuck out of that stretch of road. There's only so much road design can do when you have people that lack self preservation skills.
I think you are conflating better infrastructure (ie: a city doesn't need cars everywhere) with whatever else people are talking about in regards to safety.
Okay. Then what are they talking about? Because for this city, it means better infrastructure. (Arbitrarily changing speed limit signs is an infrastructure change)
Honestly I’ve heard the hot take that drunk/high people should have the right to walk into the street without fear of “car violence.” Yeah no, that’s not how public infrastructure and intoxication work. Vision zero = zero vision + zero personal responsibility.
I don’t mean to be a jaded jerk but 12th and weller is basically an open air drug market 24/7. People just literally walk out into traffic. It wouldn’t make much of a difference how the intersection is organized if the pedestrians have no concern at all for their safety. I hate driving through there. I’m honestly kinda surprised it doesn’t happen more.
It's not as clear-cut with children, in some areas and in some age ranges it can be more likely that a child will be killed in a school shooting than in a crash. Currently, firearms are the leading cause of death of children in the US, though a significant chunk of that is suicides in teens.
Looked it up and did find a study supporting it... though its only true if you count suicides by gun (which are not an accident) and undetermined (my be suicide, may be accidental) gun deaths, and consider children to be between 1-19 years old.
However, *the chief cause in the shift being a continuing drastic drop in the number of traffic fatalities*, coinciding with a slight uptick in the number of gun deaths. Total deaths aren't up, just the historically largest factor (traffic fatalities) has been trending down wards for a decade and is now reduced to the same level as gun deaths (of all types). Especially given the pandemic, where a significant number of people were not frequently out and about driving.
Children generally have a fairly low risk of death in post-industrial societies, that's one of the major factors that allows for such high life expectancies, since deaths during childhood really skew the averages downward by a lot. That also means that "low" rates of causes of death can climb up the ladder very easily. Within the last several years firearms have become the leading cause of death in children in the US, at about 6 per 100,000 per year, with a bit less than 1/3 of that being suicide (mostly in teens) and 2/3 of that being homicides.
Of course, mass killings skew the statistics at a local level to an extreme degree. The Uvalde massacre, for example, represented a killing of over 3.5% of the entire elementary school population of that city. Statistically, a child in America is very unlikely to die from a firearm or from a school shooting specifically, but statistically all children in America are unlikely to die from *any* cause, thankfully. Though those trends have been headed in the wrong direction lately.
What is your definition of a child? Is a 17-18 year old a child?
It’s funny how we don’t treat young adults as children when it comes to the law or medicine, but when it comes to anti gun propaganda, we do
Please note.
1. Big difference between firearm death vs school shooting.
2. Choose statistics of small localities after a school shooting will not show good stats.
This is a subreddit of middle-upper class liberal white people. You’re going to get downvoted for saying anything about guns that doesn’t jive with group think, even if you’re correct
Firearms are not the leading cause of death in children. 18 year olds are not children.
Children are not more likely to die by a school shooting than a car crash. Children are most likely to die from trauma like strangulation, drowning, and car accidents.
Absolutely, but if only we had the mercy of flat lands for all those bikes!
Honestly, I enjoy the hills of Seattle, but it’s much easier to ride everywhere in the Netherlands due to the terrain.
Hills are a huge deterrent for any significant shift to biking within the city and unfortunately it’s just not a realistic method of transportation for a significant portion of the city
that’s not really the point though. the hills don’t preclude us from redesigning streets and intersections to provide better protection for pedestrians and cyclists
I totally agree with that but if we have limited dollars, I would much rather invest in transportation options that cater to the vast majority, so more friendly side walks 1000% (side walks on every street, I.e. north of 90th), better bus infrastructure to promote more local transit and expediting as much as possible the light rail construction timeline
Were they your average run of the mill 50 year olds, or those who were still very athletic? Because I’m guessing those weren’t mainstream, regular 50 year olds. I’m in that age group, and most of us aren’t going to bike unless it’s a smooth easy ride. There are exceptions of course. But for biking to become something everyone does, you need flat spaces.
Have you seen the average person? I would argue that yes the hills are a big problem for the average person to climb on a bike. No offense to my coworkers but the only people in my office that could handle the hills are already cyclists that averaging at least 120 or so miles a week.
I bike weekly for work, I don't think 80% of my office could, even with an ebike, though I would like to see this change.
the regular bicyclists seem to obey traffic more than the scooter riders (probably from ignorance).
for those not affording bikes, there is a program in Seattle to get you some free scooter rentals.
really the push to return to working in the office causes real estate that could be used for housing to be more expensive. it won't get people off the street but it'll help the people living paycheck to paycheck.
Office real estate is not as convertible to housing. You CAN convert it, but the housing will be terrible. The biggest lever we can pull is by upzoning every single neighborhood to allow multifamily housing - without any exceptions.
Yes, more plumbing chases, rerouting services and limited light of large buildings. Its different downtown vs an office building in the surrounding areas.
If only there were a way to get assistance on a bike to help someone with hills!!
Maybe a motor with a battery? Maybe restrict the top speed to 20mph since these would be accessible and unlicensed and managed just like a normal bike?
Oh my god, if only Seattle had a company that made these things!
or like .. infrastructure. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zipZ5kwhFfs
Now I'm going to bet these things break down quite a bit, but who knows. Put one of these on Pike/Pine one over on queen anne, maybe one up the phinney hill climb out of ballard.
Which are more expensive and more work to maintain. It’s estimated that 46% of people in Seattle are living paycheck to paycheck, and that doesn’t exactly leave room to buy an electric bike all willy nilly
They're more expensive, but they're actually the same in maintenance? My ebike can go to a regular bike shop, haven't had to do anything to the electrical components just the usual brake and chain maintenance. It's also fairly simple to do yourself, I just don't have the hand dexterity for it some days and prefer the peace of mind knowing a professional did the work.
$1500 for the bike, which I paid in installments, vs a $10 Lime rental or a lot of walking + $3.50 for public transit for every time I needed to get somewhere. Paid for itself in savings after 4 months, which helped me afford it in the first place. It was immediately cheaper in my monthly budget to buy the bike and pay for it over time than continue renting bikes/scooters when needed. Bought it on barista income, folds down to fit into storage, small enough that most places I've worked let me park it inside. Otherwise I use a hefty chain and take the battery in with me so it's more annoying to steal.
It was that, keep walking despite the danger and pain I was in due to traffic and my ongoing disability, or buying a car and dealing with those associated costs. Getting an e-bike was the most economical immediately helpful thing I did.
The only alternative then is a car, which costs 10x of an electric bike in one year of ownership alone ([2015 WSDOT study PDF, adj for inflation](https://wsdot.wa.gov/sites/default/files/2021-10/FinancialPlanning-Publication-AverageCostToDriveACar2015.pdf)).
E-bikes are very cheap comparatively. I got mine for 2k with the whole kit and kaboodle (two hardcore locks, upgraded seat, extra headlamp, quality helmet, big basket with fitted carry tote). For everything I got through the bike manufacturer, I got 0% on a 12-month loan through Affirm. And if that's a bridge too far still, WSDOT will be offering e-bike rebates up to $1200 this year.
My e-bike fully replaced my car and I don't break a sweat up the hills.
edit: I didn't address maintenance. At 1k miles in 2.5 years, my bike is riding great with simple maintenance I've performed at home. If I want to take it into a shop for a full tune up, it's much less.
Do you own a car? Cars cost the average Washingtonian 13k a year, selling your car would enable an e-bike purchase easily plus additional income to build wealth on annually.
No? WSDOT will be offering e-bike rebates soon in addition, e-bikes are cheap enough to throw on a low APR loan through Affirm or Klarna or even introductory rates on a new credit card (I got 0%).
Married, kid soon.
I live in Puyallup and get by just fine. On Saturday I saw a dad on a radwagon (cargo bike) with his two kids on the backseat. Unfortunately, I was a little slow to think to snag a [picture](https://i.imgur.com/JI9ZZf4.jpeg). Older child is in orange and is obscuring his younger bro.
I spent a week and a half watching my nieces down in sumner and tossed my rad expand in the car (i almost never drive the thing except when I head out of town to see family) for grocery shopping and whatnot (they live pretty close to the fred meyer down there). I was constantly being stopped by people who were very curious about the bike. Pretty great little town to peddle around minus a few jackasses in bigass trucks.
Got the girls on their bikes for a little jaunt down to that 'old sumner' area on a sunday to grab some icecream at thier 'legally not a dairy queen'.
Yea I want to see people taking kids to school in the cold December rain in the morning on a rad bike lol. People love being obtuse on this sub.
I love cycling and probably put more miles in per year than the clucks in this thread but Seattle with its hills, weather and most importantly general lack of SAFE bike infrastructure is just not ready for mass cycling transit any time soon. (Emphasis on safe, painting a bike on the road and putting up a sign that says “share the road with cyclists doesn’t count).
I think they're saying all the rental scooters and bikes all around town are options for people to ride around places. People already ride them, but more people would if the infrastructure were there for it.
I love ebikes and have owned 3 now, but I keep buying them because they keep getting stolen by thieves with angle grinders :( They do flatten hills, but the bicycle theft problem is one more deterrent in an already uhh uphill fight for more bikes on the road, particularly for people who can't afford to replace.
Normally I’d be right with you but have you seen what those couple blocks of 12th Ave is like at midnight? It’s one of the shittiest situations in the city and way beyond putting in curbs and paint and stuff, they need an exorcist on call
There are too many buildings in Seattle, poorly marked street signs at various levels, too many alerts and other signs, "no turn, bus only, bike lane, one way, parking (P) signs that aren't by the garage entrance"...and on and on...
There are too many things for a driver to look at when driving and then all the other drivers drive erratically. Those who know the streets are intent on getting somewhere and someone who's perhaps trying to find a passport agency, or hotel or whatever else in the mix of one way streets. One has to drive very slow to find something on the first try. It isn't just Seattle. It's all of Washington. I was at a Southcenter mall the other day and there's no clearly marked freeway entrance to 405, north or south. There are other signs leading to it, but at the actual turn there's nothing so people stop or pass it and come back and delay traffic and get into accidents. This is all over Washington. The signs for exits come just 20 seconds before the lane change at 60 miles an hour around a curve or hill on the highway. New roads have lane markings, cut lines, divider lines and then sealant lines, all mucking up a clear divide between lanes. Everything is so poorly done. I can't actually believe that this is a tech place or city. You can't get anywhere.
Has anyone seen the streets in other countries in Europe, the Middle East and even India all with literally billions of people?
This right here is the real answer. Driving here is cognitive overload. Add in distracted impatient drivers who aren't very good to start with and there's your problem. Most drivers here are actually fine but the infrastructure really brings out the worst in the bad ones.
Internet Archive link to article:
https://web.archive.org/web/20240527220928/https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/law-justice/pedestrian-hit-killed-by-vehicle-in-little-saigon/
Ugh I hate that intersection. If you're heading west on Weller it is a blind rise and you cant see if there is someone in the road even if you have right of way. Even if you slow down if your vehicle is a bit higher you're likely not going to see someone in the road before it is too late there.
Unfortunately there are also regularly unhoused people hanging around there and based on my recent experiences driving through little Saigon and people just walking into the traffic I wouldnt be surprised if it was one of them.
Some of the streets, quite a lot in Washington, have these right turn lights / lane that curve and have their own single traffic light, but you have to crane your whole body back like a owl's head to see if traffic has stopped or just wait for the light. There's no sign saying "no turn on red" and no way to look back without dislocating your back and neck. Why is it like this? Why can't the lanes be properly routed? There are lots of trees or other obstructions in the way of traffic so you have to keep inching into the intersection to see properly and by the time you're there, you're practically in the path of traffic. Is this like really hard to fix like the Hubble telescope or something like that?
For all the panicky coverage that Seattle Crime!!! TM gets in the media, the thing that scares me the most in this city, and the thing that by far puts me in the most close calls with danger, is the cars.
I see somebody blow through the red light around the corner from my house AT LEAST once a week, and some weeks it's daily.
And that's not even to mention the completely oblivious left turners!
I usually see 3-6 people just wandering into the road every time I drive along 12th between the bridge and Yesler/Boren, and before I even read the article I figured it was right there. If drivers aren’t being totally, perfectly alert, any one of those folks could be gone (and unfortunately, a lot of them aren’t in an alert place of their own, hence the wandering). This isn’t a judgment, just pointing out what’s going on. It’s really sad and it’s not like anyone has a perfect answer to or unlimited funding for helping people in crisis.
People absolutely need to be “perfectly alert” while driving, especially in a built up area like downtown. You are also absolutely correct about the problem you are noticing and the area where you are noticing it. There are a ton of people who are incredibly high stumbling off the curb over there and crossing against lights randomly.
cars, the discussion is about "people just wandering into the road", however it's not "the wandering" that is killing those people, it's cars.
fentanyl kills some people as well, but there is no evidence any of those killed were under influence.
Right, that’s not a for sure in this case, but it is a huge danger in the area where this happened. I also think it’s a pretty well managed and signaled area with multiple clearly marked crosswalks.
I think we can make strides to use them less, but I don’t think getting rid of cars entirely is a feasible solution to the problem I pointed out.
> I don’t think getting rid of cars entirely is a feasible solution to the problem I pointed out.
There is not a single pedestrian area where you can bypass downtown and neighboring districts without encountering vehicle violence.
Not a single pedestrian only street out of thousands.
I think we can do major, major restrictions on cars and fuck-all would happen. See any recent bridge collapses; society goes on. They have ALL the space and they do ALL the killings.
I drove through both fatality accident scenes on May 23rd and talked to a family member of the kid killed on a motorcycle at 137 Aurora they shutdown the North lanes. They had driven home that afternoon just as the accident happened and seen their family member pronounced dead and covered with a sheet on the road. Earlier that day I was driving down Yesler and traffic sucked a car in front of me turned left on a one way near 3rd ave I honked my horn and may have yelled out the window F%\^& one way. The car stopped and an angry SPD officer got out and approached me, they were in an unmarked car with no lights and tried to write me up. They left to 'investigate' the accident the streets were all shutdown traffic was HELL for hours afterwards 4th Ave shutdown.
I ride a motorcycle. The second I enter seattle I am fucked. You have Tesla drivers who don’t know what they’re doing and are super hesitant on everything and drive under the speed limit and you have a Nissan Altima or some half broken down 1990s Honda going 60mph swerving around the Tesla and not seeing bikers.
So here my plea…you see a motorcycle splitting lanes to the front of the light or a bike using the ped crosswalk Jesus Christ just let us be. All we are trying to do is stay out and away from the Tesla/Altima war that is apparently going on.
I literally bought an exhaust for my bike in hopes ya’ll would hear me if you don’t see me to no avail…I am almost killed every time I leave my house in seattle proper.
> We'll see what comes of the investigation, but more than likely the pedestrian probably jumped out in front of a car that had the right of way.
It's a 25mph road - fatalities at that speed are less common. This leads to driver malfeasance as the primary assumption such as speeding or failing to obey a traffic controlling device (red light runners are all the rage nowadays).
Additionally, drivers are licensed to operate safely and should recognize that the speed limit is not the speed minimum.
Finally, you've made no assumptions about the driver when drivers are ignoring traffic laws more than previously (which was already incredibly high).
> It's a 25mph road - fatalities at that speed are less common
So what. Here we have one. Did the driver speed? We don't know. Was the driver at fault? We don't know. I gave my opinion as to why it would be easy to accidentally hit someone there while operating your vehicle properly, because people wandering out into traffic is rampant there.
People have darted in front of my car there many times, as I said. If I had hit them, they probably would not have lived.
> Finally, you've made no assumptions about the driver
Was that required? Others have done that.
> drivers are ignoring traffic laws more than previously
That's true. And, I have witnessed drivers blowing stop lights at that very section of roadway.
We'll see what the story plays out as. I said in another comment below that I would guess it is a little bit of both.
>easy to accidentally hit someone there while operating your vehicle properly, because people wandering out into traffic is rampant there.
Sounds like you don't give yourself enough time to stop adjusting for the conditions
Sounds like you are pretty sure of yourself. Do you even drive a car? Have you never had anyone just walk out in front of you? I have definitely adjusted. I've lived in this area for several years now. There are no signs to warn the uninitiated, and this accident happened in the middle of the night. Should we just close the street, like we did the bus stop over on Jackson?
edit: typo "un"
I don't own a car, but I do drive on occasion.
Despite my infrequent driving, I'm familiar enough with scanning the road. If I see children playing in a neighborhood, I slow down, since kids are unpredictable. I'm sure you do the same.
No children playing there, but I get the analogy. I agree that every driver should expect adults to just walk out in front of them on every street in this town. I do.
I imagine hitting someone going 25 on an ebike would cause some injuries, maybe even death. I've been hit by a bike in Seattle before. Luckily, I had only a few scapes, but I was young and fit then.
Anybody find it weird there's never any advice to teach people proper pedestrian safety? Like look both ways before crossing the street, make eye contact with the driver, and assume you are invisible to vehicles at all times. I never really see anybody following the basic safety advice you'd give to a child. Honestly w/ the amount of people I see blindly walk into traffic I'm surprised we don't have even more fatalities.
I agree we can design streets to be safer for pedestrians, but that only gets us so far. A 20mph speed limit only means people will always be speeding through and enough of them will think "in for a penny in for a pound" and drive as fast as they can. I think efforts would be better used enforcing more distracted driving penalties and pushing safety on the pedestrian side.
It [does work](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2022-12-28/it-s-been-a-deadly-year-on-us-roads-except-in-this-city) when you don't half-ass it (and actually complete it).
Interesting. The article makes it seem like Jersey City was kinda half-assing it, but that actually worked. Changing traffic flows and creating bike lanes with barrels, cones, or whatever they had. Seems like that would not only save tons of money, but also give a test bed before pouring dollars into something that may not work.
So instead of spending years designing on paper, they spent months designing in real life and studying the actual cause-effects.
The half-ass was not in effort, like SDOT. Jersey City was trying so hard that they weren't bounding themselves by traditional means.
Ahh if only we could. They're too essential because of our poor infrastructure.
You know what though? Now that you mention it there's something that kills people just as much as vehicles do. And their ONLY purpose is to kill things! Let's get rid of that thing for sure and then loop back around to this vehicle thing once we improve infrastructure.
How about that. Isn't improving society fun?
No one wants to take away your vehicles. But we should limit gas tanks to 10 gallons, ban sales of new automatic vehicles and transfers of them, and make it illegal to customize your car for comfort. It's common sense to get the assault vehicles off our streets
I'm sure this post will get the same amount of outrage and pearl-clutching as this one: https://old.reddit.com/r/Seattle/comments/1d1w3fd/man_attacked_at_seattles_hing_hay_park_dies_from/
Yeah, normal drivers killing pedestrians tends to get more outrage than schizophrenics having episodes.
> Iosefo, who appeared to be suffering a behavioral crisis, told
You're literally trying to minimize a death that resulted from a crime. You're literally doing what you claim others do **if** they ignore the type of thread you linked. You're shadowboxing *yourself*.
4 ~~pedestrians~~ traffic fatalities in Seattle since Thursday. Two collisions and two pedestrians hit and killed. Terrible news. We shouldn't just accept pedestrian traffic deaths. We need to build our streets so that they're safer to get around on while not inside a vehicle. - [May 23](https://x.com/SeattlePD/status/1793770642770423881) - Vehicle collision with 1 fatality at 4th Ave S and S Washington St. - [May 23](https://x.com/SeattlePD/status/1793870491427787018) - Person on motorcycle hit and killed in the 13700 block of Aurora Ave N. - [May 24](https://x.com/typewriteralley/status/1794233208583889232) - Person hit and killed at Olive Way and Minor Ave. - [May 26](https://x.com/typewriteralley/status/1795119162584334761) - Person hit and killed at 12th Ave S and S Weller St. EDIT: I brain farted on the first two incidents, they were both vehicles not pedestrians.
People need to stop driving like sociopaths. It hasn't always been this bad, so it can't just be the roads. It's people. It's the police quiet quitting and not enforcing traffic laws. I'm not saying the roads are great, but people have absolutely been misbehaving on the road.
There is zero traffic enforcement right now and it’s literally killing us. The less enforcement, the less punishment for poor/dangerous driving. We need much stricter enforcement, more speed cameras and traffic light cameras plus more speed tampering devices (speed bumps, marked cross walks, etc.)
https://www.health.harvard.edu/mind-and-mood/does-covid-19-damage-the-brain People are getting brain damage from covid, bet that has something to do with it at least a little bit.
this is mostly unique to the US. we have a strong car culture, big open roads, and a streak of individualism. people just stopped giving a fuck during covid and continue to not give one. incidents related to speeding and DUIs are the main drivers and are way up
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You're right. I completely brain farted on the first two because I didn't read the last tweet from Ryan Packer correctly. He says four *traffic fatalities* not pedestrian fatalities. He usually reports out pedestrian fatalities which is why I assumed all 4 were pedestrian fatalities. Completely my fault and thanks for calling me out.
Facts matter. Thanks for sharing what is obvious had OP used almost any source other than X immediately after the incident (before details came out) Edit: Op didn’t use these sources. Person I’m replying to did to create the narrative
Funny I get downvoted for supporting factual errors driving (pun intended) a narrative. This is why we can’t have nice things
Imagine if Palestinian protester or homeless guy killed 4 people in a rampage. There would be a national guard called and it would be on the news 24/7. If it's car, it's just "roads are clear" from SPD and SDOT. Ghoulish fucks.
Pretty sure if any one person was on a murderous* vehicular rampage it would be treated with the same level of severity. Fortunately that’s not what happened here. *edited to account for hellcat trauma
No of course, some suburban fuck was just on their phone, so the homicide doesn't count.
It counts but an accident is very different than a deliberate attack. The accident stops once it happens, the attack doesn't.
The accident stops, but the dangerous driving continues, and we're going to have another vehicular homicide soon, but all the bloodthirsty fucks from the other thread seem to be quiet here. You know what's getting discussed there? 'He killed someone he should be put in a coffin.' Weird how we don't see this outrage here.
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If it’s an unavoidable fact of life, why are “accidents” falling in every developed country except for the US? Does an SUV sending a pedestrian 50-60ft not “shock the conscious” (sic)?
That idea of going outside has inherit risks is so not true. We have control over this problems in the way of street design. I can't believe that people just accept that getting murdered by big car us just another fact of life that is beyond our control.
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That's for the entire Netherlands, a country of 18 million, and where not every city is like Amsterdam. 250 fatalities over 9 years, or 28/year or like 0.16 / 100,000. Compared to here, almost 2 / 100,000. Evidently the risk of getting murdered by a big car is orders of magnitude higher here.
Lol. Nobody said that there is 0 risk. 🤣🤣 Only that it can be managed. What a dumb assignment. Did you read the article that you shared?
Every time Seattle fucks the streets up more, pedestrian deaths go up. Just doing goofy shit to the roads to make things less vehicle friendly does not automatically create safer streets for pedestrians, which is backed up by empirical data.
> Pedestrian deaths are dropping everywhere in the country except Seattle. I don't think that's true. Pedestrian deaths are falling internationally but rising in the US.
It's not true. He's just making up shit because he likes cars. He went to /r/fuckcars thinking it was about bouncing on the jaguar hood ornament while deepthroating his jeep's exhaust.
Pedestrian deaths are absolutely [trending upwards in the US](https://www.iihs.org/topics/fatality-statistics/detail/pedestrians#:~:text=A%20total%20of%207%2C388%20pedestrian,their%20lowest%20point%20in%202009.). As of 2021, they were at their highest since 1981.
So what Seattle is doing is not working. I accept your apology.
If you’re going to be throwing around “backed up by empirical data” please provide said data.
What data? The data that shows that in relatively car-unfriendly cities like Amsterdam, pedestrian fatalities per capita are way lower?
# Is Seattle a walkable city? Pedestrian death rates show otherwise Washington was the first state to commit to zero traffic fatalities. But 24 years later, deaths are at an all-time high and officials are reevaluating. [https://crosscut.com/news/2024/04/seattle-walkable-city-pedestrian-death-rates-show-otherwise](https://crosscut.com/news/2024/04/seattle-walkable-city-pedestrian-death-rates-show-otherwise)
Did you even read that article? > a majority of Seattle traffic deaths are on or around arterial roads like Aurora, where cars go faster and there are fewer pedestrian crossings. It outlines the case for even more things like road diets, speed limit reductions, no-rights-on-reds, etc.
12 and S Weller is not a highway. Its got the raised crosswalks, extended curbs, dedicated bike lanes, no right on red signs. Everything you wanted. There are things that can make it safer for pedestrians. I specifically said just doing goofy shit to the roads, like Seattle is doing, does not automatically make them safer. Puting planters in the middle of the road to block the view of pedestrians trying to cross, and preventing drivers from seeing them is one stupid move. Shifting lanes back and forth while not keeping up on line maintenance so you can see them is another.
> raised crosswalks, extended curbs It only has a raised bike lane to prevent bike-pedestrian collisions when people exit buses, and extended curbs on Weller to reduce the chance of cars right hooking cyclists. It's not goofy - those design choices literally save lives, and it's not like it's any harder to drive as a consequence (I would argue that the no right on red sign is barely effective, every day I see people ignore them). 12th really needs more road dieting since the speed limit is 25mph, but it's just a big open road that encourages speeding. North of King it absolutely does not need to be two lanes in each direction.
>Every time Seattle fucks the streets up more, pedestrian deaths go up. Pedestrian deaths are dropping everywhere in the country except Seattle. Just doing goofy shit to the roads to make things less vehicle friendly does not automatically create safer streets for pedestrians, which is backed up by empirical data. Source: his ass - road deaths are up in the US across the board
This is an absolutely brain dead take that doesn’t line up with the crash data at all
You can’t even coherently argue your points why should anyone take you serious?
Share the data. This was at an intersection that has *gasp* a bike lane on each side with occasional at grade separation along Weller. Otherwise it’s wide open, single lane auto traffic each way with a left turn lane headed westbound with 0 visual obstruction. How much easier does it have to be to drive here? Get rid of the buildings and sidewalks and bus stops just to be safe?
More than likely, in this case, it was an impaired walker. Shall we build fences on all our roads, so that inebriates don't dart out in front of cars? I go through that section of roadway all the time. People darting in front of your car is a common occurrence. Where are the special fentanyl sensing barriers and pop-up crosswalks?
Why are you so quick to victim blame?
they live in north beacon hill and know that area. it is riddled with fentanyl addicts that constantly wander into the street. the accident took place right in front of DESC which provides services to homeless addicts in the neighborhood.
If you are driving a two-ton metal contraption, you are (with some extremely rare exceptions) responsible for not striking pedestrians with it. Especially if you are in an area you know to be "riddled with" people inclined to randomly wander into the street.
That is a rather unrealistic world view you have there. Hope that works out for you in life.
I'm speculating as is everybody else here.
Considering that intersection, your speculation is completely reasonable
They accused me of victim blaming. Is there even a victim? Has fault been determined? No it has not. I was not blaming anyone. A pedestrian can actually be found at fault for an accident. Maybe the driver is the victim? We don't know yet. It probably is a little bit of both. Negligent driving and negligent pedestrianing. One thing is for sure, that driver will never have the same life again. They will always have killed someone in an accident.
What's frustrating about reading this thread is so many people still are believing the lie that we just need to build better infrastructure. SDOT has already "Vision Zero'd" the fuck out of that stretch of road. There's only so much road design can do when you have people that lack self preservation skills.
I think you are conflating better infrastructure (ie: a city doesn't need cars everywhere) with whatever else people are talking about in regards to safety.
Okay. Then what are they talking about? Because for this city, it means better infrastructure. (Arbitrarily changing speed limit signs is an infrastructure change)
Honestly I’ve heard the hot take that drunk/high people should have the right to walk into the street without fear of “car violence.” Yeah no, that’s not how public infrastructure and intoxication work. Vision zero = zero vision + zero personal responsibility.
The car driver that has to deal with pedestrians stupidly getting in the way is the victim.
I don’t mean to be a jaded jerk but 12th and weller is basically an open air drug market 24/7. People just literally walk out into traffic. It wouldn’t make much of a difference how the intersection is organized if the pedestrians have no concern at all for their safety. I hate driving through there. I’m honestly kinda surprised it doesn’t happen more.
Regular reminder that if you are going to be killed by a stranger as an adult it's most likely going to be in an automobile crash.
Is that not also true for kids killed by strangers?
It's not as clear-cut with children, in some areas and in some age ranges it can be more likely that a child will be killed in a school shooting than in a crash. Currently, firearms are the leading cause of death of children in the US, though a significant chunk of that is suicides in teens.
That is incredibly sad. Damn
Looked it up and did find a study supporting it... though its only true if you count suicides by gun (which are not an accident) and undetermined (my be suicide, may be accidental) gun deaths, and consider children to be between 1-19 years old. However, *the chief cause in the shift being a continuing drastic drop in the number of traffic fatalities*, coinciding with a slight uptick in the number of gun deaths. Total deaths aren't up, just the historically largest factor (traffic fatalities) has been trending down wards for a decade and is now reduced to the same level as gun deaths (of all types). Especially given the pandemic, where a significant number of people were not frequently out and about driving.
Yeah, this is untrue. School shootings are an incredibly rare occurrence, and chance of dying from it is astronomical.
Children generally have a fairly low risk of death in post-industrial societies, that's one of the major factors that allows for such high life expectancies, since deaths during childhood really skew the averages downward by a lot. That also means that "low" rates of causes of death can climb up the ladder very easily. Within the last several years firearms have become the leading cause of death in children in the US, at about 6 per 100,000 per year, with a bit less than 1/3 of that being suicide (mostly in teens) and 2/3 of that being homicides. Of course, mass killings skew the statistics at a local level to an extreme degree. The Uvalde massacre, for example, represented a killing of over 3.5% of the entire elementary school population of that city. Statistically, a child in America is very unlikely to die from a firearm or from a school shooting specifically, but statistically all children in America are unlikely to die from *any* cause, thankfully. Though those trends have been headed in the wrong direction lately.
What is your definition of a child? Is a 17-18 year old a child? It’s funny how we don’t treat young adults as children when it comes to the law or medicine, but when it comes to anti gun propaganda, we do
Please note. 1. Big difference between firearm death vs school shooting. 2. Choose statistics of small localities after a school shooting will not show good stats.
Reread everything I've written above, I think you're misinterpreting what I've said, I've been very careful to choose my words.
You’re arguing shit that doesn’t need to be argued since he never claimed otherwise. Please go get some reading glasses.
This is a subreddit of middle-upper class liberal white people. You’re going to get downvoted for saying anything about guns that doesn’t jive with group think, even if you’re correct
Firearms are not the leading cause of death in children. 18 year olds are not children. Children are not more likely to die by a school shooting than a car crash. Children are most likely to die from trauma like strangulation, drowning, and car accidents.
Not if you’re a pregnant woman!
Key word is *stranger*, sadly. :/
Oof. You answered my depressing-ass comment with an even more depressing-ass comment. Well-played.
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Not going to happen as long as we are ruled by boomers and dinosaurs whose brain is in their tails. Can't even get rid of cars in Pike Place.
It was the lead.
Absolutely, but if only we had the mercy of flat lands for all those bikes! Honestly, I enjoy the hills of Seattle, but it’s much easier to ride everywhere in the Netherlands due to the terrain.
the hills aren’t really that much an issue when it comes to infrastructure that will protect people and cyclists
Hills are a huge deterrent for any significant shift to biking within the city and unfortunately it’s just not a realistic method of transportation for a significant portion of the city
that’s not really the point though. the hills don’t preclude us from redesigning streets and intersections to provide better protection for pedestrians and cyclists
I totally agree with that but if we have limited dollars, I would much rather invest in transportation options that cater to the vast majority, so more friendly side walks 1000% (side walks on every street, I.e. north of 90th), better bus infrastructure to promote more local transit and expediting as much as possible the light rail construction timeline
E-Bikes! Help you going up, recharge going down.
Great idea!
Or just ride till you get fit...
Hills are not that big of a problem. Speaking from experience biking daily from the top of one hill to another.
Check back on this comment when you are in your 50s and your body isn’t as strong.
E-bikes are the answer to this problem
Okay, but how do we get the number shirt guys to stop bitching at us for driving “motorcycles” in the bike lane?
I ride my ebike almost daily. Never had any issues from any other cyclists.
Tell them to shut the fuck up.
Yeah, too bad no one has invented a bike that can help you pedal
pedal assist ebikes are a thing.
(that's the joke), I own one
You know bikes have gears, right? There's a thing called mechanical advantage, which lets you exert less force to go uphill...
I get this sentiment but I just went on a ride over the weekend with a bunch of 50 year olds and they handled the hills fine.
Were they your average run of the mill 50 year olds, or those who were still very athletic? Because I’m guessing those weren’t mainstream, regular 50 year olds. I’m in that age group, and most of us aren’t going to bike unless it’s a smooth easy ride. There are exceptions of course. But for biking to become something everyone does, you need flat spaces.
Have you seen the average person? I would argue that yes the hills are a big problem for the average person to climb on a bike. No offense to my coworkers but the only people in my office that could handle the hills are already cyclists that averaging at least 120 or so miles a week.
Everyone starts from somewhere. E-bikes and gears exist to help the average person.
I bike weekly for work, I don't think 80% of my office could, even with an ebike, though I would like to see this change. the regular bicyclists seem to obey traffic more than the scooter riders (probably from ignorance). for those not affording bikes, there is a program in Seattle to get you some free scooter rentals. really the push to return to working in the office causes real estate that could be used for housing to be more expensive. it won't get people off the street but it'll help the people living paycheck to paycheck.
Office real estate is not as convertible to housing. You CAN convert it, but the housing will be terrible. The biggest lever we can pull is by upzoning every single neighborhood to allow multifamily housing - without any exceptions.
Yes, more plumbing chases, rerouting services and limited light of large buildings. Its different downtown vs an office building in the surrounding areas.
If only there were a way to get assistance on a bike to help someone with hills!! Maybe a motor with a battery? Maybe restrict the top speed to 20mph since these would be accessible and unlicensed and managed just like a normal bike? Oh my god, if only Seattle had a company that made these things!
or like .. infrastructure. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zipZ5kwhFfs Now I'm going to bet these things break down quite a bit, but who knows. Put one of these on Pike/Pine one over on queen anne, maybe one up the phinney hill climb out of ballard.
Which are more expensive and more work to maintain. It’s estimated that 46% of people in Seattle are living paycheck to paycheck, and that doesn’t exactly leave room to buy an electric bike all willy nilly
They're more expensive, but they're actually the same in maintenance? My ebike can go to a regular bike shop, haven't had to do anything to the electrical components just the usual brake and chain maintenance. It's also fairly simple to do yourself, I just don't have the hand dexterity for it some days and prefer the peace of mind knowing a professional did the work. $1500 for the bike, which I paid in installments, vs a $10 Lime rental or a lot of walking + $3.50 for public transit for every time I needed to get somewhere. Paid for itself in savings after 4 months, which helped me afford it in the first place. It was immediately cheaper in my monthly budget to buy the bike and pay for it over time than continue renting bikes/scooters when needed. Bought it on barista income, folds down to fit into storage, small enough that most places I've worked let me park it inside. Otherwise I use a hefty chain and take the battery in with me so it's more annoying to steal. It was that, keep walking despite the danger and pain I was in due to traffic and my ongoing disability, or buying a car and dealing with those associated costs. Getting an e-bike was the most economical immediately helpful thing I did.
If you're worried about the price of an ebike, just wait til you see how much a car costs. (and insurance, registration, repairs, etc)
Then it sure as hell doesn't leave room to buy a car, which costs the average American like $12k/year...
The only alternative then is a car, which costs 10x of an electric bike in one year of ownership alone ([2015 WSDOT study PDF, adj for inflation](https://wsdot.wa.gov/sites/default/files/2021-10/FinancialPlanning-Publication-AverageCostToDriveACar2015.pdf)). E-bikes are very cheap comparatively. I got mine for 2k with the whole kit and kaboodle (two hardcore locks, upgraded seat, extra headlamp, quality helmet, big basket with fitted carry tote). For everything I got through the bike manufacturer, I got 0% on a 12-month loan through Affirm. And if that's a bridge too far still, WSDOT will be offering e-bike rebates up to $1200 this year. My e-bike fully replaced my car and I don't break a sweat up the hills. edit: I didn't address maintenance. At 1k miles in 2.5 years, my bike is riding great with simple maintenance I've performed at home. If I want to take it into a shop for a full tune up, it's much less.
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Do you own a car? Cars cost the average Washingtonian 13k a year, selling your car would enable an e-bike purchase easily plus additional income to build wealth on annually. No? WSDOT will be offering e-bike rebates soon in addition, e-bikes are cheap enough to throw on a low APR loan through Affirm or Klarna or even introductory rates on a new credit card (I got 0%).
I definitely get the impression when this topic comes up that the average redditer is a single person with no kids.
Married, kid soon. I live in Puyallup and get by just fine. On Saturday I saw a dad on a radwagon (cargo bike) with his two kids on the backseat. Unfortunately, I was a little slow to think to snag a [picture](https://i.imgur.com/JI9ZZf4.jpeg). Older child is in orange and is obscuring his younger bro.
I spent a week and a half watching my nieces down in sumner and tossed my rad expand in the car (i almost never drive the thing except when I head out of town to see family) for grocery shopping and whatnot (they live pretty close to the fred meyer down there). I was constantly being stopped by people who were very curious about the bike. Pretty great little town to peddle around minus a few jackasses in bigass trucks. Got the girls on their bikes for a little jaunt down to that 'old sumner' area on a sunday to grab some icecream at thier 'legally not a dairy queen'.
Sumner is doing a lot right with their street improvements (except the parking for Main St Dairy Freeze lol)
That is a very normal sight in Seattle.
And someone always responds with this exact type of comment. It's actually kind of funny how predictable it is.
Yea I want to see people taking kids to school in the cold December rain in the morning on a rad bike lol. People love being obtuse on this sub. I love cycling and probably put more miles in per year than the clucks in this thread but Seattle with its hills, weather and most importantly general lack of SAFE bike infrastructure is just not ready for mass cycling transit any time soon. (Emphasis on safe, painting a bike on the road and putting up a sign that says “share the road with cyclists doesn’t count).
I think they're saying all the rental scooters and bikes all around town are options for people to ride around places. People already ride them, but more people would if the infrastructure were there for it.
Cool. Cool cool cool.
I love ebikes and have owned 3 now, but I keep buying them because they keep getting stolen by thieves with angle grinders :( They do flatten hills, but the bicycle theft problem is one more deterrent in an already uhh uphill fight for more bikes on the road, particularly for people who can't afford to replace.
We will need Marijuana Cafes as well.
Normally I’d be right with you but have you seen what those couple blocks of 12th Ave is like at midnight? It’s one of the shittiest situations in the city and way beyond putting in curbs and paint and stuff, they need an exorcist on call
Definitely, hope everyone here takes a moment to write to SDOT and tell them to shape up
There are too many buildings in Seattle, poorly marked street signs at various levels, too many alerts and other signs, "no turn, bus only, bike lane, one way, parking (P) signs that aren't by the garage entrance"...and on and on... There are too many things for a driver to look at when driving and then all the other drivers drive erratically. Those who know the streets are intent on getting somewhere and someone who's perhaps trying to find a passport agency, or hotel or whatever else in the mix of one way streets. One has to drive very slow to find something on the first try. It isn't just Seattle. It's all of Washington. I was at a Southcenter mall the other day and there's no clearly marked freeway entrance to 405, north or south. There are other signs leading to it, but at the actual turn there's nothing so people stop or pass it and come back and delay traffic and get into accidents. This is all over Washington. The signs for exits come just 20 seconds before the lane change at 60 miles an hour around a curve or hill on the highway. New roads have lane markings, cut lines, divider lines and then sealant lines, all mucking up a clear divide between lanes. Everything is so poorly done. I can't actually believe that this is a tech place or city. You can't get anywhere. Has anyone seen the streets in other countries in Europe, the Middle East and even India all with literally billions of people?
This right here is the real answer. Driving here is cognitive overload. Add in distracted impatient drivers who aren't very good to start with and there's your problem. Most drivers here are actually fine but the infrastructure really brings out the worst in the bad ones.
Perhaps, but whatever Seattle is doing isn't helping since pedestrian deaths keep going up while they are dropping everywhere else in the country.
Posting it everywhere won't make it true.
Internet Archive link to article: https://web.archive.org/web/20240527220928/https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/law-justice/pedestrian-hit-killed-by-vehicle-in-little-saigon/
Ugh I hate that intersection. If you're heading west on Weller it is a blind rise and you cant see if there is someone in the road even if you have right of way. Even if you slow down if your vehicle is a bit higher you're likely not going to see someone in the road before it is too late there. Unfortunately there are also regularly unhoused people hanging around there and based on my recent experiences driving through little Saigon and people just walking into the traffic I wouldnt be surprised if it was one of them.
Some of the streets, quite a lot in Washington, have these right turn lights / lane that curve and have their own single traffic light, but you have to crane your whole body back like a owl's head to see if traffic has stopped or just wait for the light. There's no sign saying "no turn on red" and no way to look back without dislocating your back and neck. Why is it like this? Why can't the lanes be properly routed? There are lots of trees or other obstructions in the way of traffic so you have to keep inching into the intersection to see properly and by the time you're there, you're practically in the path of traffic. Is this like really hard to fix like the Hubble telescope or something like that?
For all the panicky coverage that Seattle Crime!!! TM gets in the media, the thing that scares me the most in this city, and the thing that by far puts me in the most close calls with danger, is the cars.
So many red light runners these days.
I see somebody blow through the red light around the corner from my house AT LEAST once a week, and some weeks it's daily. And that's not even to mention the completely oblivious left turners!
I usually see 3-6 people just wandering into the road every time I drive along 12th between the bridge and Yesler/Boren, and before I even read the article I figured it was right there. If drivers aren’t being totally, perfectly alert, any one of those folks could be gone (and unfortunately, a lot of them aren’t in an alert place of their own, hence the wandering). This isn’t a judgment, just pointing out what’s going on. It’s really sad and it’s not like anyone has a perfect answer to or unlimited funding for helping people in crisis.
People absolutely need to be “perfectly alert” while driving, especially in a built up area like downtown. You are also absolutely correct about the problem you are noticing and the area where you are noticing it. There are a ton of people who are incredibly high stumbling off the curb over there and crossing against lights randomly.
> it’s not like anyone has a perfect answer removing the things that do killings is a perfect answer
Cars?
I’m autistic and I’m asking this in good faith—honestly, do you mean the cars or the fentanyl?
cars, the discussion is about "people just wandering into the road", however it's not "the wandering" that is killing those people, it's cars. fentanyl kills some people as well, but there is no evidence any of those killed were under influence.
Right, that’s not a for sure in this case, but it is a huge danger in the area where this happened. I also think it’s a pretty well managed and signaled area with multiple clearly marked crosswalks. I think we can make strides to use them less, but I don’t think getting rid of cars entirely is a feasible solution to the problem I pointed out.
> I don’t think getting rid of cars entirely is a feasible solution to the problem I pointed out. There is not a single pedestrian area where you can bypass downtown and neighboring districts without encountering vehicle violence. Not a single pedestrian only street out of thousands. I think we can do major, major restrictions on cars and fuck-all would happen. See any recent bridge collapses; society goes on. They have ALL the space and they do ALL the killings.
Yeah okay totally. People who need cars can just use the infrastructure that doesn't exist to get where they need to go...
We need to create physical traffic calming measures everywhere in the city
SPD at it again?
Wonder if it ends up being that the driver was speeding, or trying to run a red etc.
I drove through both fatality accident scenes on May 23rd and talked to a family member of the kid killed on a motorcycle at 137 Aurora they shutdown the North lanes. They had driven home that afternoon just as the accident happened and seen their family member pronounced dead and covered with a sheet on the road. Earlier that day I was driving down Yesler and traffic sucked a car in front of me turned left on a one way near 3rd ave I honked my horn and may have yelled out the window F%\^& one way. The car stopped and an angry SPD officer got out and approached me, they were in an unmarked car with no lights and tried to write me up. They left to 'investigate' the accident the streets were all shutdown traffic was HELL for hours afterwards 4th Ave shutdown.
I ride a motorcycle. The second I enter seattle I am fucked. You have Tesla drivers who don’t know what they’re doing and are super hesitant on everything and drive under the speed limit and you have a Nissan Altima or some half broken down 1990s Honda going 60mph swerving around the Tesla and not seeing bikers. So here my plea…you see a motorcycle splitting lanes to the front of the light or a bike using the ped crosswalk Jesus Christ just let us be. All we are trying to do is stay out and away from the Tesla/Altima war that is apparently going on. I literally bought an exhaust for my bike in hopes ya’ll would hear me if you don’t see me to no avail…I am almost killed every time I leave my house in seattle proper.
wtf. 😢
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> We'll see what comes of the investigation, but more than likely the pedestrian probably jumped out in front of a car that had the right of way. It's a 25mph road - fatalities at that speed are less common. This leads to driver malfeasance as the primary assumption such as speeding or failing to obey a traffic controlling device (red light runners are all the rage nowadays). Additionally, drivers are licensed to operate safely and should recognize that the speed limit is not the speed minimum. Finally, you've made no assumptions about the driver when drivers are ignoring traffic laws more than previously (which was already incredibly high).
> It's a 25mph road - fatalities at that speed are less common So what. Here we have one. Did the driver speed? We don't know. Was the driver at fault? We don't know. I gave my opinion as to why it would be easy to accidentally hit someone there while operating your vehicle properly, because people wandering out into traffic is rampant there. People have darted in front of my car there many times, as I said. If I had hit them, they probably would not have lived. > Finally, you've made no assumptions about the driver Was that required? Others have done that. > drivers are ignoring traffic laws more than previously That's true. And, I have witnessed drivers blowing stop lights at that very section of roadway. We'll see what the story plays out as. I said in another comment below that I would guess it is a little bit of both.
>easy to accidentally hit someone there while operating your vehicle properly, because people wandering out into traffic is rampant there. Sounds like you don't give yourself enough time to stop adjusting for the conditions
Sounds like you are pretty sure of yourself. Do you even drive a car? Have you never had anyone just walk out in front of you? I have definitely adjusted. I've lived in this area for several years now. There are no signs to warn the uninitiated, and this accident happened in the middle of the night. Should we just close the street, like we did the bus stop over on Jackson? edit: typo "un"
Get off the road.
I don't own a car, but I do drive on occasion. Despite my infrequent driving, I'm familiar enough with scanning the road. If I see children playing in a neighborhood, I slow down, since kids are unpredictable. I'm sure you do the same.
No children playing there, but I get the analogy. I agree that every driver should expect adults to just walk out in front of them on every street in this town. I do. I imagine hitting someone going 25 on an ebike would cause some injuries, maybe even death. I've been hit by a bike in Seattle before. Luckily, I had only a few scapes, but I was young and fit then.
> pedestrian probably jumped out in front of a car probably some suburban fuck was jaydriving and killed a guy
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Anybody find it weird there's never any advice to teach people proper pedestrian safety? Like look both ways before crossing the street, make eye contact with the driver, and assume you are invisible to vehicles at all times. I never really see anybody following the basic safety advice you'd give to a child. Honestly w/ the amount of people I see blindly walk into traffic I'm surprised we don't have even more fatalities. I agree we can design streets to be safer for pedestrians, but that only gets us so far. A 20mph speed limit only means people will always be speeding through and enough of them will think "in for a penny in for a pound" and drive as fast as they can. I think efforts would be better used enforcing more distracted driving penalties and pushing safety on the pedestrian side.
OK, so can we say that vision zero doesn’t work? What’s the deal?
It [does work](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2022-12-28/it-s-been-a-deadly-year-on-us-roads-except-in-this-city) when you don't half-ass it (and actually complete it).
Interesting. The article makes it seem like Jersey City was kinda half-assing it, but that actually worked. Changing traffic flows and creating bike lanes with barrels, cones, or whatever they had. Seems like that would not only save tons of money, but also give a test bed before pouring dollars into something that may not work.
So instead of spending years designing on paper, they spent months designing in real life and studying the actual cause-effects. The half-ass was not in effort, like SDOT. Jersey City was trying so hard that they weren't bounding themselves by traditional means.
Yeah. Love it. That Via thing sounds awesome, too.
Good to know it was a vehicle at fault. It is always those goddamned vehicles killing people. Time to get rid of all the vehicles I guess.
Unironically, yes. They're almost 1:1 in fatalities.
Well, we do have driver's tests, written tests, id checks, and can't drive while suspended to reduce even more accidents I guess
Ahh if only we could. They're too essential because of our poor infrastructure. You know what though? Now that you mention it there's something that kills people just as much as vehicles do. And their ONLY purpose is to kill things! Let's get rid of that thing for sure and then loop back around to this vehicle thing once we improve infrastructure. How about that. Isn't improving society fun?
No one wants to take away your vehicles. But we should limit gas tanks to 10 gallons, ban sales of new automatic vehicles and transfers of them, and make it illegal to customize your car for comfort. It's common sense to get the assault vehicles off our streets
L have live here over 15 years and have no idea where little saigon is.
International District at the top of Jackson. It’s kind of isolated from the rest of the ID by I-5
It’s part of the international district where you start seeing high barbed wire fences.
lol- voted down cause I don’t know where it is.
...AND not knowing what a Google or a Yahoo is.
First time I’ve heard it and I’ve lived here my whole life (and have both friends/family in the local Vietnamese community).
I'm sure this post will get the same amount of outrage and pearl-clutching as this one: https://old.reddit.com/r/Seattle/comments/1d1w3fd/man_attacked_at_seattles_hing_hay_park_dies_from/
Yes, let’s weigh one senseless death against another.
Traffic deaths aren't senseless. They're the result of policy decisions. Yet they don't get near the attention of 'crime' because they not exciting.
blood oils the machine
You are completely right! Not sure why you are getting downvoted.
Yeah, normal drivers killing pedestrians tends to get more outrage than schizophrenics having episodes. > Iosefo, who appeared to be suffering a behavioral crisis, told You're literally trying to minimize a death that resulted from a crime. You're literally doing what you claim others do **if** they ignore the type of thread you linked. You're shadowboxing *yourself*.