The New Jersey Mayor With a Plan to End Traffic Deaths
www.bloomberg.com
In Hoboken, Mayor Ravi Bhalla has worked to redesign city intersections, install bike lanes and slow traffic. The result? Six-plus years of no pedestrian fatalities.

The mayor of Hoboken, NJ came in with a vision of reducing traffic deaths to pedestrians and cyclists. He instituted several strategies of traffic calming, increasing pedestrian visibility, reducing city wide street speeds to 20 mph with schools and parks down to 15 mph. Within a few years of road improvements and redesigns their pedestrian traffic deaths to zero for several years.

The article does note that half of the streets have bike lanes, they’ve put buffers between pedestrians and cars, and continue to redesign intersections with a focus on safety instead of just focusing on car speed/throughput.

  • cobra89@beehaw.org
    5·
    11 months ago

    He still added bike lanes that weren’t there before no? How is that harming personal non-car transit? Maybe go to city council meetings and ask that double parking in bike lanes be enforced. I would certainly think the city wants to make money from fines.

    Also how many people are riding around on rollerblades? The “hexagonal bullshit” makes the bike lanes distinct and noticeable increasing awareness and also gives tactile feedback if a driver starts driving on the bike lane. Yeah it sucks for skateboarders but the tradeoffs are worth it, especially because again, how many skateboarders are there really? Some municipalities don’t even allow skateboards in bike lanes because the drastic speed difference between them and bikes tends to cause issues.

    Could the bike lanes be better? Absolutely, they could be actually protected bike lanes like you pointed out but don’t let perfect be the enemy of good, they don’t “suck”. And 0 pedestrian deaths over the span of a few years is very very good.