Where We Invest in Vision Zero, We Make Progress

It can be easy to feel discouraged about Vision Zero progress as traffic deaths and severe injuries remain astronomically high in the U.S. But there are reasons for optimism.

Vision Zero efforts, though relatively new and primarily locally led, face significant national challenges. Cultural norms and legacy infrastructure complicate progress. More people are driving at higher speeds, and more drivers are dangerously distracted. These issues are exacerbated by larger and heavier vehicles on our roads, which significantly increases risks, especially to pedestrians. And, the U.S. remains light years behind other nations in implementing proven safety standards and regulations.

A more encouraging picture emerges when we look at what’s happening on the ground – literally. Despite many challenges, communities that are taking Vision Zero seriously and starting to implement Safe System strategies are yielding positive results. Success stories include small cities preventing traffic deaths for years and streets redesigned for slower speeds halving the number of severe injury crashes. And while they may feel like isolated examples, importantly, they show what is possible to turn around the nation’s road safety crisis. And while they may feel like isolated examples, importantly, they show what is possible to turn around the nation’s road safety crisis — especially when paired with what’s working and where cities are headed next.

We see reasons for local leaders and advocates to feel hope and to double-down on their Vision Zero efforts. The first reason: proven strategies exist to make our streets safer. As shared in the examples below, where communities are investing in slower speeds and safe space for people to move, they are succeeding in reducing severe crashes, injuries and deaths; they are saving money; and they are making their communities more livable, healthy and equitable. However, progress remains slow and fragmented when this work is done slowly and in piecemeal fashion. So, a key to advancing Vision Zero lies in scaling up what works – implementing proven solutions, such as those detailed below, with greater speed and breadth across communities. 

And second, more accountability for Vision Zero is being expected of state and federal partners.  For too long, local leaders have shouldered blame for safety challenges beyond their control, but that dynamic is beginning to change. Slowly but surely, more action and accountability are being urged at state and federal levels. Below, we describe two timely opportunities ripe for this stepped-up leadership.

Let’s start by looking at on-the-ground results from meaningful safety investments.

1 – We know what works: Safety investments yield safety results

When communities invest in Safe System strategies — such as redesigning problematic streets and lowering speed limits  — they see tangible improvements in safety and livability. While many still wrestle with high rates of traffic deaths and severe injuries overall, it is important to recognize that where meaningful safety measures are put into place, safety improves. This is a reason to speed up and scale up these proven safety efforts citywide. Some examples include:

Austin has measured a 22% reduction in fatal and serious injury crashes at 22 high crash intersections targeted with Vision Zero safety improvements, compared to a 1% increase for a comparison group of other signalized intersections in the city. This safety progress has been accompanied by an annual comprehensive crash cost savings of more than $28 million.

Analysis in Austin shows that low-cost changes can have big safety impacts. In locations where the City enhanced signage and traffic signal heads and/or added flashing yellow arrows, the annualized number of Opposite Direction-Left Turn injury and fatal crashes decreased by 47%. 

Safety improvements on Austin's popular Barton Springs Road demonstrate the power of pilots. In a one-year trial that included reconfiguring travel lanes, improving pedestrian crossings and adding physically separated bikeways, crashes dropped by 17%, along with a two-thirds decrease in the number of drivers traveling 10+ mph over the speed limit. Notably, the safety improvements had minimal impacts to motor vehicle travel times. City staff are transitioning the pilot to a more permanent state.

Philadelphia has measured a 34% reduction in fatal and serious injury crashes and a 20% reduction in severity of injury crashes in locations where they made significant safety changes, compared to High Injury Network trends. Highlights include:

• Road diets, or reducing travel lanes and reallocating roadway space, have resulted in 18% fewer total injury crashes.
• Separated bike lanes have led to 17% fewer total injury crashes and twice as many bike riders. 
• Neighborhood Slow Zones, benefitting from new traffic calming measures and speed limits reduced to 20 mph, have 75% fewer crashes and no fatal or serious injury crashes. 

Philadelphia’s use of speed safety cameras on Roosevelt Blvd, long known as the city’s most dangerous road, has led to 50% fewer traffic deaths, 36% fewer crashes and a 90% reduction in excessive speeding in the first seven months of their use.  (See Vision Zero Network’s recommendations on using speed safety cameras more effectively and equitably.)

Portland, Oregon has been implementing proven safety measures to lower speeds and prioritize more safe space for people walking and biking. These include reducing the number of vehicle driving lanes and repurposing space for other uses such as bike lanes, on-street parking, curb extensions, street trees and bioswales. Results include the following:

• A 72% reduction, on average, in top-end speeding (vehicles traveling more than 10 mph over the speed limit) on streets where the city has converted travel lanes to center turn lanes with pedestrian islands, bike lanes and bus lanes. 
• A 94% decrease in top-end speeding on four corridors with speed safety cameras.
• A 13% reduction in turning speeds with calmed left-turns, a model but meaningful reduction. Evaluation reports in Portland (and New York City) show the lifesaving results of slowing vehicle turning speeds and improving left-turning drivers’ views of crosswalk at intersections.

Montgomery County, Maryland tracked a 28% reduction in serious and fatal crashes on the  High Injury Network (HIN) corridors where they have focused meaningful Vision Zero changes, as compared to a 5% increase on non-HIN roadways. Improvements include new sidewalks and bikeways, additional protected pedestrian crossings, improved transit options and enforcement efforts, including speed safety cameras focused on high-risk speeding.

San Francisco measured safety progress along 18 Vision Zero projects (a combination of Quick Build and capital projects) over several years and found that traffic collisions, overall, decreased by 18% in these locations. Bicycle-related collisions decreased by 33% and pedestrian-related collisions decreased by 32%. 

Boston saw a 30% reduction in the odds of speeding for vehicles traveling faster than 35 mph when it reduced its default speed limits from 30 mph to 25 mph. This is notable because it is at these higher speeds that crashes are most dangerous, especially for those walking.

Seattle saw a 20-40% reduction in crashes along arterial streets with reduced speed limits and increased sign density according to an independent study by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS). This work was preceded by a new policy to reduce 90% of citywide speed limits to 25 MPH. Seattle is employing multiple traffic calming tools to physically reinforce slower speeds on streets, such as narrowed travel lanes, retimed traffic signals, and speed humps and speed cushions.

Like many U.S. cities, Seattle saw an uptick in traffic fatalities in the following years, particularly during COVID. Still, more recent efforts have yielded measurable safety results, including reducing injury crashes by 18% on streets where speed limits were lowered from 30 to 25 mph and where the density of speed limit signs were increased. 

The Federal Highway Administration describes that traveling too fast for conditions or exceeding the posted speed limits - is a contributing factor in 29 percent of all roadway fatalities and shares speed case studies and this one-page summary with examples from Seattle to Iowa to help decision-makers around the country support life saving efforts.

Broader Systemic Investments Lead to Bigger Safety Success

Then there are stand-out examples of communities that have implemented Safe System changes more fully and holistically and over a longer period of time – leading to more impressive safety results. 

New York City, which has the longest history of Vision Zero work in the U.S., reduced overall traffic deaths by more than 12% and pedestrian deaths by 45% between 2013 and 2023. The changes credited most with improving safety include NYC’s work to lower speed limits citywide (from 30 to 25 mph), add speed safety cameras, install leading pedestrian intervals, retime traffic signals, and increase the number of street redesign projects that help slow vehicle speeds. NYC can tout not only saving lives and preventing serious injuries, but also massive cost savings. The City saved $90 million in healthcare costs over the first five years of its Vision Zero changes. 

Hoboken, New Jersey has achieved seven consecutive years without a traffic-related death. These results are part of a holistic effort that includes lowering citywide speed limits to 20 mph and a 15 mph signal progression; adding protected bike lanes, Leading Pedestrian Intervals, enhanced crosswalks and curb extensions; reducing travel lane widths; and daylighting intersections. 

Fremont, California cut fatalities by 45% from 2015 to 2020 by redesigning streets and lowering speed limits, especially on high speed arterial streets. Most of Fremont’s arterials were built with 12’ to 14’ wide travel lanes. To manage speeds for safety, Fremont implemented a 10’ travel lane standard on all arterial roadways, demonstrating that “engineering details matter.” This dedicated work has resulted in a 32% decrease in pedestrian fatalities and a 67% decrease in fatal and serious injury crashes among youth. 

These success stories come from communities that have been working meaningfully toward Vision Zero for longer, including making more significant street design changes and showing the political will to lower speeds for safety. Some ask: Why aren’t there more examples of smaller communities? Mainly because early-adopters of Vision Zero have been larger cities. However, in large part thanks to support from the federal Safe Streets and Roads for All grant program, hundreds more communities are now investing in Vision Zero plans and efforts, and we can expect more safety success stories in the years to come.

So, here's the million dollar question: If we know what works and can measure specific successes like the ones above, why are we not seeing more citywide reductions in traffic deaths and injuries? 

The answer is pretty simple. For the most part, these examples represent safety improvements made at specific, limited locations. To realize true citywide benefits, these types of changes need to be scaled up citywide and more quickly. This will take stepped-up leadership to: 

• Proactively address not only obvious problematic locations but also many other locations that share the same problematic characteristics (such as streets designed for high-speeds that are likely candidates for future injuries and deaths). Read about New York City’s impressive Turn Calming program, a citywide effort to reduce vehicle turning speeds at intersections with many people walking.
• Hasten the pace of meaningful, citywide changes, including lowering speed limits, redesigning roads and using Quick Build techniques to calm traffic. The common approach of spending years studying and planning before making life-saving changes simply won’t cut it anymore. 
• Double-down on what communities have local control over, which is a lot, and speak up for increased state and federal responsibility and action to address the road safety crisis. More on this below.

2 - States & Feds Must Step Up to the Safety Plate

It’s the elephant in the room, and we can’t ignore it: Locals cannot address the nation’s traffic safety problems on their own. Some fundamental safety changes can only be addressed by state and federal leaders. While the list is long, we’ll highlight one area at each the state and federal level that are ripe for attention.

First, states need to acknowledge and better address the outsized role that state-owned roads play in today’s preventable traffic safety crisis. More than half of fatal crashes in U.S. urban areas occur on roads owned or managed by states. These are roads often designed and signed for high speeds and without appropriate attention to people outside of cars. Local leaders have little-to-no authority to make safety changes on these dangerous roads.

This has real-life ramifications. For example, Austin reduced road fatalities by 20% on local roads where it focused its Vision Zero improvements between 2016 and 2022; meanwhile, traffic deaths increased a whopping 98% on the state-owned roads in the city. 

The NBC investigative series Driven to Death highlights the high proportion of dangers on state-owned roads in Texas and in states across the country. It's a vicious cycle: States increase the number of auto travel lanes to try to "lessen congestion," which leads to more driving and higher speeds, and this leads to more frequent and more deadly crashes. As the series describes, despite knowing this, the Texas Department of Transportation often resists readily available tools to manage speeds and improve safety. Meanwhile, local-level leaders and agency staff face resistance from state leaders when they try to address problematic state-owned roads within their community.

One encouraging example is the partnership between the Illinois Department of Transportation and the Chicago Department of Transportation (CDOT). They developed a Memorandum of Understanding to streamline the implementation of safety measures, including approximately 400 miles of roads under state jurisdiction in Chicago. The agreement expedites the approval process for infrastructure designs, facilitates the deployment of proven safety countermeasures, and benefits neighborhoods and vulnerable road users. 

Similarly, Portland, Oregon is taking ownership of some of its most deadly – and state-owned roads – such as 82nd Avenue and Powell Boulevard and garnering federal and state funds to make much-needed safety improvements. 

Then there’s the federal level, where stepped up attention is sorely needed, particularly to improve vehicle safety for people outside the vehicles. By now, we’ve probably all seen the scary statistics about the dangers of car bloat. Basically, as locals work to redesign streets and lower speeds in their communities, much of their progress is overrun by national trends of cars getting bigger, heavier and more dangerous to those outside them.

In 2023, nearly half of pedestrians killed in Chicago were hit by an SUV or a larger vehicle. It can't be ignored that the severity of injuries in a traffic crash is amplified by the speed and size of vehicles. Heavier vehicles take longer to stop and strike with more force compared to lighter vehicles. So, while CDOT works on safety on the local roads they control, and with the State of Illinois on state-owned roads described above; CDOT also points out where federal safety leadership is needed. See excerpt from Chicago's Traffic Crashes Annual Report, Fall 2024.

We need automakers and federal policymakers to live up to their safety responsibilities in ways that only they can. This includes leadership from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) to require proven safety technology in vehicles, such as Intelligent Speed Assistance (ISA), alcohol detection systems and pedestrian detection systems. (Learn more in the PBS News Hour report about how new rules would prevent crash deaths and injuries.) And, longer-term, we need national leaders to recognize and address the policies that prop up America’s dangerous shift to ever-bigger cars. Difficult to do? Yes. Needed to advance Vision Zero? Absolutely.

Doubling Down on What Works & Compelling State, Federal Action

U.S. communities face significant challenges in advancing Vision Zero compared to many other nations, including land use policies that promote more car travel and less robust transit, walking and biking environments, dispersed decisionmaking (local, regional, state and federal government levels), and fewer vehicle safety regulations, just to name a few.

So, it’s not surprising that adapting a Vision Zero approach to the U.S. context is taking more time and concerted effort than in some other countries. These are not quick and easy fixes, but rather fundamental changes to the engrained status quo. 

We applaud the lifesaving efforts of dedicated Vision Zero professionals in transportation, public health and other agencies, as well as community-based advocates. We urge them to scale up and speed up implementation of safety strategies that work. And we encourage locals to join us in calling on state and federal leaders to significantly step up their attention and urgency to road safety. We know how to change the status quo approach that permits 40,000+ preventable traffic deaths each year. And we know we need to do more of what works.