2022 Vision Zero Call to Action Petition
The Way to Zero Traffic Deaths is on the Bus: 2022 Vision Zero Call to Action
Add your name to this petition to show your support for Denver Streets Partnership’s 2022 Vision Zero Call to Action.
Read: Vision Zero: Our 2022 Call to Action
Remarks by Jill Locantore and Molly McKinley at the 2022 Ride and Walk of Silence on May 18.
Jill Locantore
Executive Director, Denver Streets Partnership
Good evening, and thank you for joining us on this beautiful spring evening for Denver’s fifth annual Ride and Walk of Silence.
I am Jill Locantore, Executive Director of the Denver Streets Partnership.
We are here tonight to honor the 114 people who have been killed in preventable traffic crashes on our City’s streets since January of 2021. We are acknowledging that traffic fatalities are not just numbers, but 114 individuals with friends and families and neighbors who loved them. The victims of traffic violence are people with names and, this year, the list of names is the longest it’s ever been since we’ve first started hosting this memorial event. As we’ve written these names on signs, hung the signs at crash sites across the city, and carried the signs with us tonight, my heart overflows with grief.
It is not hard to understand why these tragedies keep happening. You all just experienced the condition of our major arterials like Federal Boulevard. These arteries carry the life blood of our community. Tens of thousands of people travel them everyday to access employment, and education, and essential services. And it is on these arterial streets where, predictably, blood is spilled every week.
On these streets the roar of traffic is overwhelming, and the threat of violence is ever present. It’s tempting to blame the drivers on these streets for their lack of care and concern for others, but they are just people too, like you and me, simply using the streets as they were designed – as highways for moving vehicles, not places for human beings with all our imperfections and our fragile bodies.
It does not have to be this way.
I want you to close your eyes, and imagine a Federal Boulevard that is not only safe, but inviting. The street is quiet, because there are fewer cars, driving slower. The bus stops are full of people who are relaxed, confident that a bus will come within a few minutes and take them quickly where they need to go. You can hear people talking on patios, enjoying a delicious banh mi or a taco, and you can hear children laughing as they cross the street, unafraid. This version of Federal Boulevard, and Colorado Boulevard, and Colfax Avenue, and Alameda Avenue is possible, if we actually get serious about reducing our deadly dependence on cars.
At the heart of this much-needed transformation is the bus.
When we redesign streets to prioritize the bus, we can still move lots of people quickly over long distances, but much more safely and without taking up nearly as much street space. When we free up street space from cars, we can add better sidewalks, and bike lanes, and safer crossings, and trees that provide beauty and shade. When we leave the driving up to trained professionals, we can relax and enjoy the ride, without worrying that in a moment of distraction, we might kill an innocent person.
And so today, the Denver Streets Partnership is releasing our Vision Zero Call to Action, asking our leaders to rise to the occasion and take the bold steps required to actually realize our commitment to eliminating traffic fatalities and serious injuries.
We call on the City of Denver to rapidly expand the miles of dedicated bus lanes on priority transit streets, particularly the most dangerous streets like Colfax and Federal, and the miles of sidewalks and protected bike lanes that provide safe connections to and from transit.
We call on the City, RTD, and CDOT to move swiftly and collaboratively to fund and implement the vision for a comprehensive network of Bus Rapid Transit that serves not just downtown and bedroom communities, but all corners of our city.
We call on all levels of government to fund not just transit infrastructure, but also frequent all-day transit service, so that bus lines don’t just exist, but are actually a useful way to get around.
We call on our leaders to take these actions to honor the lives that have been lost to the violence of a culture that prioritizes cars over people.
We can, and we must, prevent more of these tragedies from happening.
Molly McKinley
Policy Director, Denver Streets Partnership
Good evening, y’all. I’m Molly McKinley, policy director at the Denver Streets Partnership.
In our staff meeting on Monday I took some time to acknowledge how heavy this part of our work is. We stand here tonight among the names of people who have died on Denver streets since the start of 2021, and as you walk, bike or drive around Denver you may see some of these same names in the locations where the preventable crash that took their lives occurred. Some of our staff and many outstanding volunteers with the Denver Bicycle Lobby have been placing these signs around Denver.
In our meeting, I shared about my own struggles with this part of our work and encouraged our staff to find ways to take care of themselves — talk to me, talk to each other, close the computer and step away from the work for a bit. This is the hardest part of our work — being faced with the real, human cost of inaction, that just sometimes feels completely insurmountable — but it’s also, by far, the most important.
After the meeting, my friend and colleague, Aishwarya shared with me a passage from a book she’s been reading and I’m going to share it with all of you. It’s from Jessie Singer in her book There Are No Accidents. She says “accidents are predictable and preventable. It should not require so much loss and so much rage to stop something so wholly in our power to stop. But, this is the work left to those of us left behind. Our love and rage is all we have.” I’m going to read those last two sentences again—sit with them for a second. “This is the work left to those of us left behind. Our love and rage is all we have.”
Friends, sometimes I feel discouraged, I feel so angry, I feel rage, I feel deeply sad, I feel defeated. Our transportation system is designed to kill people and it feels like we as advocates push and push to save lives and it never feels like those with the power to make change are moving fast enough to meet the moment. We show up to remember lives lost, call on leaders, take action. And then we do it again. And again. Maybe you wonder if it’s making a difference. I’m here to share with you that despite all of the moments I question it myself, at the end of the day, I think it is.
It’s nights like tonight that remind me what we’re doing is making a difference. I feel love because all of you, the community, continue to show up, pitch in, and invite others in. I feel hopeful because there are members of the news media in Denver who are riding bikes to break stories—they’re thinking about the systemic impacts of our transportation system, they’re asking tough questions that hold city leaders accountable. And, I feel hopeful because there are state, regional, and local agencies — and dozens of leaders within them — who have the power to make changes that will save people’s lives.
The changes we’re calling for are easy enough to make if we have the political will and public support behind them. That’s why, in closing, I want to ask you to add your name to a petition supporting the call to action that Jill outlined in her remarks. You can find it through the QR codes at our table or by visiting bit.ly/busessavelives. Adding your name means we can continue to build support for transformative action for safer streets. Perhaps more importantly, I invite you to keep showing up. Because, remember, this is the work left to those of us left behind and we cannot afford to lose any more community members to preventable traffic crashes. Our love and rage is all we have.