As our transportation options continue to expand, we need to prioritize the needs of pedestrians, cyclists, and users of public transit. Complete Streets policies are a key part of this effort, and a recent report from the National Complete Streets Coalition (NCSC) sheds light on the progress we’ve made in adopting and implementing these policies across the United States.

Let’s learn from the cities showcased in the May 2023 NCSC Best Complete Streets Policies report and take a close look at the successes and lessons learned from cities that have embraced these policies.

This blog post will break it all down for you.

Progress and Collaboration: First, let’s take a look at the progress we’ve made so far. Over the past four years, 157 cities have adopted new Complete Streets policies, bringing the nationwide total to an impressive 1,740. That’s thanks in large part to the collective efforts of organizations like the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Stantec, and the National Complete Streets Coalition (NCSC) Steering Committee. So, bravo to them!

The Importance of Complete Streets: But why are Complete Streets policies so important? Well, for starters, they play a crucial role in reducing traffic violence, promoting health equity, and addressing the pressing challenge of climate change. Plus, they make our communities more livable and accessible for everyone, regardless of their mode of transportation. Isn’t this something we all want? (Mayor Harrell: This would make you our hero, if you help lead our city with this.)

Room for Improvement: But even with all this progress, there’s still room for improvement. The NCSC report notes that the average score for policies evaluated in this report has increased, but we need to do a better job of prioritizing underinvested and underserved communities. We need to address the systemic discrimination and exclusion that has long plagued transportation planning.

Road Safety: And let’s not forget about the increasing danger on American roads. 2021 was the deadliest year since 2005, so we need state and federal action to address this issue. Luckily, the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) includes a Safe Streets and Roads for All Program, so we’re moving in the right direction.

Success Stories: But enough doom and gloom. Let’s take a look at some success stories. Tucson, AZ; Howard County, MD; El Paso, TX; and Joplin, MO have all adopted strong Complete Streets policies. They’ve shown us the importance of community engagement, attention to detail, coalition building, and proactive land-use planning. So, take notes!

The NSCS report highlights lessons learned from four cities that have adopted strong Complete Streets policies: Tucson, AZ; Howard County, MD; El Paso, TX; and Joplin, MO.

Tuscon, AZ

Tucson’s policy was successful in part because organizers engaged community members as valued participants in the planning process. Tucson’s Complete Streets policy, which was unanimously adopted in 2019. The policy was developed over three years with the help of grant funding.

A diverse group of stakeholders was involved in the process, including individuals from city agencies and external organizations. The policy was also shaped by community input, with workshops held to gather feedback. The policy emphasizes equity, with specific measures to prioritize underserved communities. The policy has led to changes in project selection and design, but some challenges remain.

Key lessons learned from Tucson’s experience: The importance of engaging community members and operationalizing equity.

Howard County, MD

Well done to all those who helped realize the Howard County’s Complete Streets policy! Howard County’s Complete Streets received a perfect score from the National Complete Streets Coalition. The city took six years to develop it. However, this teaches us the importance of taking time to get the details right.

Howard County’s Complete Streets policy was adopted in 2019. Initially, the city’s policy was developed over three years, with community input and feedback playing a key role. The main players in the policy’s development included Streets for All, a coalition of organizations, as well as county officials.

Key lessons learned:

• The policy prioritizes equity, with specific measures to identify and prioritize underserved communities.
• We also find in Howard County’s policy clear guidelines for exceptions, which helps ensure accountability. The policy led to the update of the community’s Design Manual, which now reflects Complete Streets goals.

El Paso, TX

The city’s health and safety concerns borne out of its growth and development spurred El Paso’s Complete Streets policy. The El Paso’s Complete Streets Coalition formed in 2020, but it took two years for the city to adopt the policy. The coalition researched other Complete Streets policies for best practices, and used Tucson’s policy as a starting point. Not surprisingly, the coalition faced some resistance from city staff, but ultimately gained support by emphasizing the long-term benefits of the policy.

Unanimously adopted in 2022, El Paso’s Complete Streets policy was developed through a collaborative effort between advocates, city planners, and decision makers. The policy has succeeded in part because the coalition used multiple strategies to get their message out.

Key lessons learned:

• The importance of building a strong coalition and taking advantage of opportunities to share the message.

• A focus on equity, community context, and proactive land-use planning.

Joplin, MO

Similar to the previously mentioned cities,Joplin’s Complete Streets policy was in response to the city’s growth and development patterns that led to health and safety concerns. Joplin’s 2018 Bicycle and Pedestrian Transportation Plan cited the need for travel options outside of a car to better serve low-income residents, people with disabilities, and older adults.

In 2019, Joplin joined the National Complete Streets Coalition’s Complete Streets Consortium, which provided resources and knowledge to help the city draft a strong policy. Then, in 2020 Joplin received a Livable Community Initiative grant, which helped fund the drafting of the Complete Streets policy.

After a long process of drafting, revising, and garnering support, the policy was adopted in 2022 .

Key features of Joplin’s policy:

• a focus on equity, community context, and proactive land-use planning.
• the importance of building a strong coalition, taking advantage of resources, and continuing the conversation after adoption.
• close coordination during the implementation process, including city departments and community stakeholders.
• the benefit of funding and technical assistance from various sources.
• specific measures to ensure accountability and implementation.

The policy scored highly on the National Complete Streets Coalition’s policy framework, with particular strengths in equity and community engagement. Aimed at improving multimodal transporation options, the policy addresses safety concerns in that framework. Kudos!

Lots to digest, I know. In an upcoming blog post, we’ll dive into the 2023 Complete Streets Policy Framework Updated.

The post How can Seattle improve its Complete Streets policy? first appeared on FLEMING LAW | Top Personal Injury Attorney: Seattle Bike | Pedestrian | Road Crashes.

Remember: This PBL is on a roughly 5% descent and bicyclists can’t help but pick up momentum. The PBL also jogs a bit, or, as an SDOT engineer explains in a deposition, it “tapers”. (See previous blog post for the details). Thus, engineers should consider sight lines and visibility issues, which the City didn’t in this project.

Our Opposition to the City’s Motion for Summary Judgment points out that SDOT failed to make even basic sight distance calculations. Below is a view that a bicyclist on the descent down the Roosevelt PBL. Notice the bus shelter to the left that sits north of the pedestrian crosswalk that my client walked across?

The post The City of Seattle & King County shouldn’t blame the pedestrian. first appeared on FLEMING LAW | Top Personal Injury Attorney: Seattle Bike | Pedestrian | Road Crashes.

Seattle software developer was walking to his job, when a driver hit him with their car near the Fremont Bridge. He lost weeks of work and time to enjoy with his family for the entire summer and fall of 2019.

After the injured pedestrian was taken to the hospital, his family contacted Catherine Fleming to represent him. Although prepared to go to trial, the driver’s insurance settled for $490,000. The settlement covered his $34K in medical bills and also compensated him for his pain and suffering and loss of enjoyment with his family. He is fully recovered physically, but will always relive the trauma whenever he walks near the site where he was injured.

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In her mild mannered way, she’s successfully pushed for safer roads, rail and communities. Sure, AOC has a flashier way that grabs people’s attention. Maybe Maria Cantwell is too busy for social media as Chair of the Committee of Science, Commerce and Transportation. (Hey, I caught you snoring.) Not a super sexy topic? It is to me. And Sen. Cantwell holds significant power in her role. Let’s talk more about how she’s helped and, more importantly, how else we want her to help us make our communities safer.

Love her or hate her, Washington Senator Maria Cantwell is more than a figurehead for Washingtonians.  Personally, I appreciate her softer spoken style. Most of my career, people point out that I’m not as loud as my male counterparts. Is that so wrong? Sen. Cantwell’s results is proof that one doesn’t need to speak loudly to make a big difference. #QuietIsBetter #SaferRoads

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If you ride your bike anywhere in Seattle, you know about road hazards. Potholes, major elevation changes, and streetcar tracks are all bad news. These road hazards cause bicyclists to fall before they can do anything to stop it.

Aside from a stream of buses that often share bike paths, Seattle bicyclists must contend with drivers turning in front of them, drivers pulling into park in curb lanes, and maneuvering in spaces that don’t offer much separation from pedestrians. On top of this, Seattle bicyclists must avoid altogether or cross over streetcar and railroad tracks at the precisely correct angle. One might wonder how this is bike friendly. We do. We have for years and are constantly working to improve safety for everyone who travels these roads.

But the fact remains that Seattle roads with streetcar tracks create dangerous conditions for bicyclists and people who use wheelchairs, walkers, canes, or strollers.

Is this a new development? Not unless you consider something more than 10 years old “new”. Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) knew about this extreme danger as far at least as far back as 2007, years before it began construction of its First Hill Streetcar line. SDOT engineers, planners, and consultants emailed and discussed the issue they faced as the number of crashes and injuries grew resulting from bike tires getting trapped in streetcar tracks for the South Lake Union Trolley (SLUT… yes, that’s what we called it before “SLU Streetcar”) tracks.

By 2010 a number of bicyclists hired attorneys and sued the City of Seattle. These cases were consolidated  (often done to streamline the court’s packed docket) and were set for trial in Seattle.

Fast forward a few years later. The attorneys for the injured bicyclists thought that the internal memos and emails from SDOT planners and engineers sufficed to establish the City’s negligence because the City had known that the tracks were dangerous. This is where the SLUT cases fell apart for the injured bicyclists.

In response to those attorneys’ argument, the City attorneys countered convincingly before King County Superior Court Judge McCarthy:

“We never disputed the tracks were a hazard,” said Rebecca Boatright, assistant city attorney who handled the case. “The legal question was whether we fell short of any engineering standard in designing a road with a streetcar.” (Seattle Times)

Judge McCarthy‘s ruling, dismissing the case, sent a chilling message: The City did nothing wrong and did not fall short of engineering standards despite its knowledge that placement of SLUT tracks on the curbside lane was dangerous for bicyclists. The dismissal of SLUT cases was a death knell for bike vs. streetcar tracks cases in Seattle. For over a decade, bicyclists who wanted to fight the City for injuries sustained because of streetcar tracks were out of luck, on their own with piles of medical bills and doctor’s visits for months or longer. No attorney was willing to take these types of cases. Bicyclists and road safety advocates knew that the dismissal of the SLUT cases was a huge setback for any other bicyclist who might want to sue the City for similar reasons.

Why did Judge McCarthy rule against the injured bicyclists who suffered only because of the unsafe road design around South Lake Union?  We’ll discuss that in another blog post.

Thankfully, one attorney did not give up. Catherine Fleming advocated for years on behalf of bicyclists injured after streetcar tracks trapped their bike tires. Catherine’s hard work led a heightened recognition of the serious dangers that the City’s design created. She also obtained a record award, requiring the City to study and rethink modifications to improve safety in some of the most troublesome spots with streetcar tracks.  She’s not done, though, and is more passionate than ever about advocating for safer streets, not just for her clients but for everyone.

Check back and learn more about the ongoing dangers that Seattle streetcars pose for bicyclists and pedestrians.

If you want to learn more about a different road safety issue in Seattle, let us know on Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter!

The post Part 1: Seattle street cars and bicyclists first appeared on FLEMING LAW | Top Personal Injury Attorney: Seattle Bike | Pedestrian | Road Crashes.

For years, the folks who aren’t crazy about bike commuters have complained about Seattle spending too much money, space and resources to its Bicycle Master Plan (BMP). The BMP has served as the main reference for SDOT to plan and design bike projects in the City. The goals were great and lofty. Let’s reduce greenhouse emissions, make it safer for people to get around on their bikes, and make the City more livable.

SDOT has not executed its plan perfectly. Alarm bells go off when the same problems leading to serious bicyclist and pedestrian accidents persist. However, my friends at Seattle Greenway, Cascade Bicycle Club, Seattle Bike Blog, and I  (among many other concerned advocates) are now sounding alarms in a big way. This is because the new Seattle Transportation Plan (STP) is developing with lightening speed (hard to imagine, I know) without prioritizing bicyclist safety as follows:*

• No real transparency – public engagement/outreach should have occurred at the earliest stages. Now, as it’s poised for final approval, we still don’t know enough details.
• Priority is given to freight, transit, and pedestrians –   Hey, these are all important. We are all pedestrians. But walking isn’t practical to get from Magnolia to Capitol Hill for a meeting (especially on a super soggy day). But what about all the years SDOT has devoted to its BMP?
• This means –>STP does NOT include planning to move more people on bikes through the City, leaving gaps between bike paths so that people must find their way to the next bike path.–> Not safe and not consistent with the City’s promise and goal of Vision Zero and Safer Streets.
• Drivers. STP is all about the drivers.  Again, I get it! I drive a lot too. But that’s because my work involves representing injured bicyclists and pedestrians along with injured drivers. So, I have a keen awareness of how unsafe many spots are in the City for bicyclists.
• What about the two E’s…Emissions and Equity?  As it stands today, the STP sidesteps multimodal conflict by removing the BMP! Say what? People from less well off communities in the City and their transportation needs are not figured into the equation. And Seattle now wants to whistle by the graveyard and avoid the issue of how freight, transit and drivers will contribute to great emissions for all.

The above is the reality right now and are precisely why advocates like Clara Cantor and Gordon Padelford (and me) are very concerned. Recall that SDOT has talked about its vision for a safe, connected, more bike-friendly roads. But with its new STP, SDOT’s silence to the BMP is deafening. This matters, especially now as companies are opening up their offices and workers are hitting the road in droves. Seattle Bike Blog​‘s latest post beautifully explains why this matters…now.

What can you do? Speak up! Tomorrow’s Seattle City Council Transportation Committee begins at 9:30 am\ Sign Up to give a verbal public comment here. Sign-up opens at 7:30 am. 

• Meeting Details and Link to agenda
• Watch the meeting live via the Seattle Channel (no opportunity to give public comment)
• **Thanks to Clara Cantor, Executive Director of Seattle Greenways, for sharing essentially all of the key points in this blog post!! ❤️👏👏

The post Seattle’s latest transportation plan, “STP3” first appeared on FLEMING LAW | Top Personal Injury Attorney: Seattle Bike | Pedestrian | Road Crashes.

Only a year ago, SDOT’s head transportation engineer, Dongho Chang, cited City’s designs as harmful to people. While still at SDOT, Chang provided his perspective about the spike in pedestrian injuries on our roads. The explanation wasn’t just about the increase in population and heavier vehicles.

He understood that Seattle’s road design issues were leading to serious pedestrian injuries, “Our street design is harming people …conforming to the rules is hurting and killing people outside the vehicle in urban cities where people are the priority.”

The now WSDOT engineer has a similar wish as I and virtually every road safety advocate in Seattle. We want the City to walk the walk and execute on its promises. Don’t just tell people that the City prioritizes pedestrian safety. Show us by taking more traffic calming measures.  As Chang mentioned: “The alarming trend [in Washington] really highlights the fact that we need to think about how we ensure that if someone does make a mistake that it’s survivable.”

SDOT has talked a lot about the Seattle Transportation Plan, which now supersedes the Bike Master Plan (BMP) and other SDOT plans. Yet, its focus seems heavily shifted towards moving freight and cars. This is a red flag. Engineers should focus on what best protects pedestrian and bicyclists, along with drivers. “Excess traffic lanes” that encourage speeding, does not need to exist as “conditions dictated by engineering” (per Chang).

Washington law requires the City and every municipality in this state  to design, plan, construct and maintain roads that are reasonably safe for all travelers. Keller v. City of Spokane, 146 Wn.2d 237 (2002). SDOT owes a duty to provide well designed streets that prioritize pedestrian and bicyclist safety.  It is not for us to carry the burden of SDOT’s persistent application of outdated transportation engineering rules. Walk the walk, SDOT. More to come. #SDOT #WalkTheWalk #SaferSeattle #FlemingLawSeattle

The post Dear SDOT: Please walk the walk! Don’t just talk about your commitment to safety! first appeared on FLEMING LAW | Top Personal Injury Attorney: Seattle Bike | Pedestrian | Road Crashes.

Seattle recently reported its new and improved proactive approach to pedestrian safety (to use FHWA’s language.  Below are excerpts of a 2020 City of Seattle Dept. of Transportation (SDOT) report:

…the number of overall traffic-related fatalities continues to trend downward. However, pedestrian and cyclist crashes have remained relatively steady. To meet
the growing demand while improving safety, the City developed the Bicycle and Pedestrian Safety Analysis (BPSA), a robust approach to modeling pedestrian and
bicyclist safety. [Emphasis added.]

BACKGROUND ON SEATTLE’S BPSA
The City of Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) first implemented the Bicycle and Pedestrian Safety Analysis (BPSA) in 2016 as a data-driven approach for understanding where, how, and why crashes involving pedestrians and bicyclists happen. [Citation omitted.]

Phase 1 laid the foundation for conducting the statistical analysis. It included pedestrian and bicycle crash data from 2007 to 2014, as well as roadway, demographics, transit, lighting, traffic signal presence, and pedestrian and bicyclist volume data.

Note, however, a 2020 SDOT study includes the below graph, which seems to challenge its conclusion about pedestrian accidents remaining “relatively steady”.

Does SDOT’s graph here really show that Seattle is “holding steady” with pedestrian accidents? Hint: The orange line is spiking up.

Here’s what we are seeing at Fleming Law: Pedestrian injuries are growing at a rapid pace, even with the pandemic. Clients have come to us to represent them against negligent drivers, bicyclists, and cities. Cities and all Washington municipalities have a

…well-established duty to maintain their roadways in a condition safe for ordinary travel. This duty is not limited to the roadways themselves, and does not exempt municipalities from responsibility where the unsafe condition is caused by a roadside condition like vegetation or other sight obstructions. See e.g., Wuthrich v. King County, 91555-5 (Jan. 28, 2016).*

Municipalities are negligent when they fail to meet their duty to design, construct, and maintain roadways that are reasonably safe for all travelers in Washington State.

Important takeaway: When SDOT knows that major hazards for travelers arising from its design and construction of a road, an injured pedestrian (or bicyclist or driver) has a legal claim for damages against SDOT.  As our own pedestrian/bicycle injury attorney Catherine Fleming has seen with her clients, recent designs have have led to catastrophic injuries, In particular, clients we represent have suffered as the result of unsafe road design and maintenance that include protected bike lanes, bus stops, and marked crosswalks.

While people continued to get hurt or killed because of unsafe roads in Seattle, we need SDOT to quicken its pace and intensify its focus to provide adequate means for all of us to get around this city.

* I am proud of my colleagues at my former firm, Keith Kessler and Ray Kahler, both in Hoquiam, WA, who helped cement the law on behalf of Mt. Wuthrich.

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