Good luck crossing our mean streets

Well, it finally happened.

Not in the way I thought it might happen, not in the place I thought it might happen, but those are mere quibbles. It happened — a car, a crosswalk and an incident, with me.

I was halfway home from an IJ reunion in Novato on my e-bike, about an hour and a half ride that’s mostly on bike paths far from the hustle-bustle of roads and cars, when I had to cross the street by the Mall at Northgate to continue on my way. I was just about out of the crosswalk with the “walk” light in my favor when I saw the car immediately to my right, in the turn lane, moving. Toward me.

Marin’s Red Rocker famously sang that he couldn’t drive 55, the national speed limit in 1984, when the song came out, and it seems like no one else can stick to the speed limit either.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” I screamed.

He slammed on the brakes and stopped barely an inch from me but it was too late. I was already midair, landing hard on the pavement on my left hand, breaking it. A second or two earlier and it likely would have been a much uglier outcome. I count myself lucky.

I have long thought I was going to experience something like that while crossing one of the main streets in my town for my daily morning walk to the dog park. Despite a flashing light that was installed a few years ago that alerts drivers, “Hey, there’s someone in the crosswalk,” I have had a few near misses in the past year.

Some drivers give me a little “oops” wave and a mouthed, “Sorry!” Some slam on their brakes so hard that they cause a chain reaction of near-rearenders. Others never see me at all and plow right through.

And so I have become one of “those” people who screams at drivers: “Slow down!”

If it were just happening on that street in my town, well, that would say something about the drivers around me. But it’s happening all over the country. According to the Governors Highway Safety Association, the rate at which drivers struck and killed pedestrians jumped dramatically — 21% — in 2020, even though there were fewer drivers on the road thanks to pandemic lockdowns.

The association also found that pedestrian deaths increased 46% nationwide in the past decade, while other traffic deaths rose by a mere 5%.

So much for walking being good for you!

Recognizing that there’s a problem, Gov. Gavin Newsom recently signed into law a bill that will give cities and towns in Marin and elsewhere more flexibility in setting speed limits. It allows cities like mine to lower speed limits by 5 mph in places where there have been frequent traffic injuries or on streets used by large groups of bicyclists and pedestrians, especially children, older and disabled people, and people experiencing homelessness.

Cool, cool, cool, except the street I cross every day, which has its fair share of kids getting to school and sports activities, and older people such as — ahem — myself, hasn’t experienced frequent traffic injuries, just a lot of nearmisses. And lowering the speed from its current 25 mph to 20 mph won’t do much of anything because no one is actually driving 25 mph. More like 35 or 40 mph, maybe more.

Marin’s Red Rocker famously sang that he couldn’t drive 55, the national speed limit in 1984, when the song came out, and it seems like no one else can stick to the speed limit either.

I’d share with you the reactions I’ve gotten from other drivers when I’ve actually driven the 25 mph speed limit, but this is a family newspaper and so I can’t. Feel free to use your imagination.

And that’s the problem. You can pass laws and change speed limits and enact all sorts of regulations, and people are just going to be people. We’re distracted or in a hurry or sleep-deprived or the sun’s in our eyes or any number of things that keep us from seeing flashing lights and a person or animal in the crosswalk or on the curb waiting to cross. We’ve all done stupid or dangerous things in our cars at least once, maybe more. I know I have. It’s a disaster waiting to happen at a time when more of us are riding bikes and walking.

What we need to do is design our streets so pedestrians and cyclists are safer, like roundabouts and street lights. We can do it if we want to. And we also need to rethink our dependence on cars. As freelance journalist Erin Sagen writes:

“The threat car emissions pose to the environment gets some attention. But what we Americans are still in total collective denial about is how lethal our car dependency already is. Every year, nearly 40,000 people die in crashes, and at least another 3.3 million are seriously injured. Cars put us in clear, imminent danger every day, especially the most vulnerable and marginalized: Motor vehicle traffic is a leading cause of death for children, well ahead of firearms or drownings. Among adults, Black and brown people are more likely to die or be injured by cars than white people are.”

I’m typing this column with my right hand only. It’s a tad sore by now.

But I’m lucky. One day I, or you, may not be.