New report shows City of San Diego falling short on Vision Zero initiative

SAN DIEGO (KGTV) — Ten years ago, the City of San Diego made an ambitious pledge called Vision Zero, with the goal of the pledge to reach zero pedestrian deaths.
from the local policy group Circulate San Diego found there were 37 pedestrian and bicyclist deaths last year.
Back in 2014, a year before the city signed onto the initiative, there were only 25.
While the city is missing the mark and is going backward from the ultimate goal, the report says San Diego’s numbers are lower than the national rate.
Circulate San Diego is crediting the city’s efforts to create safer roads such as adopting more quick-build programs, adding roundabouts, adding stop signs, and making crosswalks easier to see.
In simple terms, the city is doing a good job, but what it is doing is not good enough. One way the city is falling short on this is the timeline of projects.
One example of an extended timeline is the

University Avenue is one of the areas the city is trying to improve as a part of the Vision Zero initiative because the intersection of University Avenue and 44th Street is considered one of the
in the City of San Diego.
ABC 10News has been following the progress of the construction
. In previous reporting, the city says construction is “approximately 60% complete and is expected to be substantially completed by the end of the year.”
Now looking at the city’s website, that construction project is not expected to be completed
. The author of Circulate San Diego’s report, Will Moore, says that regardless of the type of project, whether it be a quick-build or more extensive project, the city needs to work faster.
“I think the voters, the citizens are tired of these two-year timeframes to make a plan that’s going to do something in 2040,” Moore said. “What we find is that there are a lot of different ways to do [quick builds], but when we do even the more complex non-quick-build projects we need to shorten our planning timelines and shorten our construction timelines.”
Some of the solutions the report outlined are streamlining construction projects and adding more safety technology like red light and bus cameras to monitor roads. According to the city’s budget, $33.2 million is going to be allocated to the Vision Zero Initiative next year. However, Moore says the city needs to allocate more resources to the projects.