From WXXI news.

This is connections.

I'm Evan Dawson.

Our connection this hour was made late one night in Rochester this past summer when a man was visiting one of his favorite stores.

36 year old Lafayette Chapman stopped at Hooked Fish Market on Driving Park Avenue, as reported by Spectrum News.

Knowing his fondness for cakes, the market staff ordered Chapman a piece as the store was closing.

But what happened next was tragic.

As Chapman was walking away.

He was struck by a car, which then slammed into the market.

He was badly injured, taken to the hospital and died the next morning.

Rochester police told the Democrat and Chronicle the crash was the result of a chain reaction.

One struck a second, causing the second car to veer off the road and hit Chapman and the store.

Both drivers were located and the driver of the second car was charged with driving while intoxicated.

She was sentenced earlier this month.

Data shows that impaired drivers are likely to make the same mistakes as sober drivers, but more often.

A new report from triple AA released this morning shows pedestrian deaths have increased by more than 80% in the last 15 years.

Almost all of those fatalities occurred on urban arterial roads after dark.

What would it take to eliminate all traffic deaths and severe injuries here in Rochester or in our region?

And what are we willing to do to be able to achieve that goal?

Those are some of the questions explored by strategists who work on Vision Zero.

That's an initiative that has seen success in reducing fatalities and injuries in places like New York City.

How about Rochester?

Well, from reducing speed limits to creating pedestrian priority zones to establishing a bicycle spine network, the leaders behind Vision Zero Planning in Rochester do want to hear from you.

And Rochester Mayor Malik Evans announced last June that the national initiative is embraced now in Rochester.

The Rochester Beacon is hosting a forum tomorrow morning and they would love to have you there.

If you are interested in this kind of stuff at all.

They would love to have you there.

We'll talk about how you can do that coming up.

This hour our guests are talking about that Vision Zero forum, and we're talking about some of the costs and benefits of making some of these proposed changes.

Kent Gardner is a member of the editorial staff at the Rochester Beacon, former chief economist at the center for Governmental Research.

I think a pretty avid bicyclist.

Is that correct?

That's correct.

Okay.

And it's great to see you back here.

Thank you for being here.

It's nice to be here.

David Riley is a principal transportation specialist with the city of Rochester.

Thank you for being here.

Thank you.

Evan.

Mitch Gruber is a member of Rochester City Council.

Thank you for being here, Council member Gruber.

My pleasure.

Although I'm not excited, there's cameras on us.

Is that right?

There's cameras and Sky news YouTube channel.

Oh, my gosh, what happened to just having a face for radio?

The world has changed so much.

The world has changed.

You know what I found out when I saw the cameras?

I think I might be bulb.

It makes two of us.

So, Yeah, we are in the news YouTube channel.

and, Kent, before I have to say this, I think everybody should hear this.

Kent walked in and was like, Evan, your your introduction was kind of off base here because I said, you know what?

How would you feel?

Asking everybody listening.

How would you feel if your local speed limit was reduced?

Maybe it's 30, maybe it'd be 25, maybe it's 35 and it'd be down to 20 or 30 or 25.

Maybe there's a 45 near you and you want to see that at 40 or 35.

And Kent said, wrong question.

You didn't like the framing there.

Why?

Well, the question at the first question ought to be, how would you feel if speed limits were actually enforced?

So what are you saying?

Speed limits aren't enforced?

Oh, oh.

Perish the thought.

you know, and we know this is a problem.

Nationwide, police reform of police forces are understaffed.

And we know if you're looking at violent crime or you're looking at, you know, dealing with people who are driving, you know, 40 in in a 30 or 40 5 or 30, you know, what the police are going to focus on.

You know, they've got to focus their resources on the more serious issues.

Understandably so.

Yeah.

And fatalities on the road are serious.

Okay.

But they're not urgent.

And just because of the frequency, you know, you really can't afford to have a cop sitting on every corner.

And the same thing is true for, you know, for all sorts of other traffic infractions, you know, pulling through red lights, all that sort of thing.

So if we're not enforcing, it doesn't really matter what the law says, okay.

But when you say enforce, take, take Lake Avenue, which again, I do feel like I should get a medal for having never been in an accident.

Lake Avenue, despite living up in Charlotte every day, up and down.

And I see wild things there.

You know, I think I mentioned before my my daughter lives right off of.

Yeah.

So, you know, around Lake all the time, wild people fly.

But when you say enforce the speed limit, there's a difference in people's minds between okay, that means if I'm in a 35 and I'm going 45, they're going to ticket me versus 35 means 35.

What do you mean?

Well, I honestly, I think one of the issues we have on the roadways is not simply people speeding, but it's also differential speeds on a roadway.

And I think that's been proven that, when when vehicles are traveling at different speeds, that it creates a greater, level of hazard.

So, I mean, if we want to make it 35 and we're going to consistently enforce 35, that's fine with me.

If we're going to call it 40 and consistently force at 40, that's fine.

But when people but but but the other.

So that's that's one problem.

You know what is the true speed limit.

If you want to talk to a motorist I can really get away with 45 in this zone.

But but the more serious problem is that you can travel it.

You can be in a 35 zone, or you can be driving 50, and the odds of you are getting caught are very low because again, the police do not have the resources to follow, everybody on the roadway.

Well, okay.

True, but there's a difference between if a cop sees you going 18 over the limit, you're getting pulled over almost every time.

If the cop sees you versus I think I can get away with nine miles of single digits or less.

I'm never getting pulled over.

And I'll be honest with you, that's my mentality as a driver.

I always feel like mine.

Whatever, whatever.

I'm on the road.

If it's single digits over, I'm safe.

Yeah, I don't, I don't.

I think the perfect is the enemy of the good.

Do we want to pass a 35 mile an hour speed limit and make absolutely sure that nobody ever goes over 35?

I think that's crazy.

I don't think we need to do that.

I think we need to police the the people who are creating, raise it to 40, but make it 40.

How about that?

I honestly, I really, honestly don't care.

I think people are always going to see the speed limit as something that they can exceed by a bit.

and I'd be really surprised if, if you raised it to 40 and you really absolutely enforce that 40 people would go nuts.

that's that's just a culture change.

But that would take a while to change that culture.

But it would be a culture change that would apply to everybody who drives in the community.

I mean, there.

I don't know of any jurisdictions that, that will issue a citation for going five miles over or seven miles over I that just doesn't happen.

So I don't know that we can change that expectation in Rochester.

And I don't think it's necessary again.

So you're arguing against your own point here though.

No I'm not.

No, he's arguing for a standard issue.

The issue is there's no there's currently no standard whatsoever.

And even the idea of of 40 versus 25, we have to be able to differentiate between highways, commercial corridors, residential streets.

None of this stuff is, is, is done with a, with a, you know, with a blanket, with a broad brush.

We have to think about what is the standard.

And there really isn't one right now.

And Rochester's issue with lack of enforcement on the roads is not unique.

This is every city.

Many cities, by the way.

It's not just because of workforce shortages in the police department.

It's also because cities have said we actually don't want to have traffic stops.

Traffic stops have led to a whole lot of of bad, of bad issues and bad instances.

And so there's kind of walking away from it.

We need to have a standard.

We need to be clear about what it is.

And that's in part what Vision Zero is about.

Okay, I hear all that.

And again, this is probably just me being a little obtuse here.

But if the goal if if the goal is to get people to drive more safely.

Yes.

And part and parcel of that is to drive slower.

Yes.

Yeah.

Okay.

So wouldn't reducing the speed limit from 35 to 25 have a better chance of doing that than just enforcing the limit there?

I, I respond in two ways.

Okay.

One is I think the question of whether 25 is I think what tends to happen is we say, well, we really want people driving 35, so we're going to lower the speed limit to 25.

Then we're really at 35.

Yeah.

But then you've got a lot of people out there are kind of pissed off, frankly, that they, you know, because there are people out there who look at 25 and they'll say, well, it's going to be 25.

So once again, you've got this variation in speeds on the roadway, which is also a problem.

So I mean, I think standards are important.

Standards require enforcement.

And do you really think it's worth our resources to ticket people who are going 30 in a 25 or I, I mean, I think the goal is to get rid of the people who are creating a safety problem.

They should be able to do that.

Okay.

You want to add something here?

I was just going to say I get Ken's point about establishing standards.

And maybe the the point is to establish the standard.

But an important thing to keep in mind is the data shows that speed is one of the most critical factors in whether a crash results in somebody getting seriously injured or killed.

You know, the difference between getting hit at 25 miles an hour versus 35 miles an hour versus 40 miles an hour is huge in terms of the victim.

and that's something I think we have to take into consideration when we're talking about this.

So and I can't disagree with that.

Not at all.

Okay.

Once again, it doesn't matter what what the number is you're shooting for.

If you're not enforcing it, it doesn't mean anything.

In a moment, I'm going to read an email that I think will at least establish a little more broadly why we're having this conversation.

But before we do, I just want to make sure listeners know you can attend tomorrow.

It's not just about speed limits, don't worry.

Although it does get people exercised as we see, starts at 9 a.m. tomorrow at the Central Library in the Gleason Auditorium on South Avenue.

Light breakfast.

And then the Vision Zero plan is going to explain, laid out, and, anything else you want people to know, Kent Gardner, about the event tomorrow, the Vision Zero event while the lead off is the mayor, of course.

But, coming after that, we've, asked a fellow named, one, Martinez.

That's terrible.

Juan Martinez, to come here.

He was very involved in developing the Vision Zero plan when he was a member of the transportation department in New York City.

He's part of the Vision Zero Network.

One has a depth of experience in this.

And so he's going to bring his experience from trying to implement this in New York City.

And, you know, I mean, implementation it's not the plan.

And so much as it is the implementation, we can have lots of great plans.

And it's like the speed me, you know, or the speed.

That's great.

If we haven't figured out how to implement a reduction in the speed limit, we might as well not bother.

So go ahead.

Councilmember.

Yeah, I'd like to just zoom out a little bit.

And first of all, really encourage people, first of all, to come to the event.

But second of all, as you listen to this program and think about what kind of questions you might have, look at the RAC Vision Zero plan.

It's right on the website.

just Google Rock Vision Zero.

You'll find a pretty nice, part of our city's website to look at.

It's a ten point plan.

And I want to be really clear that vision Zero is not, it's not a cookie cutter approach.

It's a it's it's a it's a set of plans for a desired outcome.

It's called Vision Zero because the goal is have zero traffic and pedestrian fatalities.

That is the express purpose of Vision Zero.

Every city and every municipality that's that's adopted.

A Vision Zero plan is going to have a different road map to get there.

Ours is the ten point plan that you'll see on the site.

We're going to talk about it in depth.

tomorrow at the event.

And just to bring home the point you were talking about before, to, to a finer to a finer point is that within the ten point plan, one of them is reducing the speed limit.

Another one is to, consider automated enforcement as, something to invest in.

You know, right now we have to have the conversation as, as, legislative body, do we want to just lower the speed limit?

The state actually allowed, for for municipalities to reduce the speed limit, I think it was last year or the year before, David, that that legislation got adopted at the state level.

And already, my colleagues in Albany, the Albany City Council, have reduced the speed limit.

They didn't do anything about enforcement, they just reduced the speed limit.

And I think it's a really worthwhile question.

And this is the root of it.

Does reducing the speed limit change behavior at all?

Or if you're accustomed to enforcement not happening, does it do nothing.

And so we have to learn from Albany.

We have to think about what we want to do here.

We have to understand from other communities what have they done about enforcement in this very changing world of law enforcement?

How do we do it effectively?

And our Vision Zero plan?

And this is the key here, brings together an internal team across Cross Departmental.

Almost every department in the city is represented in this cross departmental team, and a team of external stakeholders.

Individuals who are passionate about this subject who may not be their profession.

It's what they're passionate about.

Bringing that group together and figuring out how to prioritize and adopt these ten policy points is what this is all about.

In a moment, we're going to talk to David more about some of these specific points.

Kent, let me just close the the loop here.

one other point that I want to make sure I understand your point on the speed limit.

So take Lake Avenue and let's say everybody knows or is used to 35, but everybody drives 45 to 50 or more.

because they don't feel like it's enforced.

My feeling is that if you go to 25, of course, a significant number of those drivers, even if they're grumbling, will drive 35, because to them, the cap is ten and I'd be in that category.

So I would look at that and say, okay, well that's the number.

Now I don't want to get pulled over.

So I am going to reduce part of what I think you said earlier is there is a an increased danger also when there's a high variation in speeds.

So if you have people who culturally just used to know enforcement, this is a 35 and they look at 25 and they go, I'm going 45.

And a lot of other people are gone 35 or 30.

Then there's an added danger element there.

You think absolutely.

David's points an important one.

I mean, we need to take a look at average speeds on the roadways.

We we know that's that that that speed is dangerous.

We know that, you know, that speed causes all sorts of other problems.

So we need to get speeds down.

but getting speeds down is more than simply the stroke of a pen.

We're going to make the speed limit lower.

That's that's kind of my basic.

And Lake Avenue specifically, if, I mean, if you took the speed limit down to 25, that's the people aren't going to start driving 25 or 35 unless you change some things about the about the way the road actually feels as well, or you put with the signs, there's automated enforcement.

We're taking pictures like just having a changed sign is not enough to change reality for some.

Yeah.

And I guess to your point, if it's for some but not but not for most, then all you do is further endanger people.

I think that's the whole point of this.

We have to have standards.

We have to have clear communication, we have to have a community wide goal, and frankly, we have to have cheerleaders around it.

Lake Avenue is a great example because back in 2013, I think it was when the state actually offered to do a road diet on the portion that they own.

The community around Charlotte said, no, we do not want a road diet.

We want it to continue to feel like a highway.

We need to actually make sure there are community led.

There are community leaders who are saying what we have right now is not safe.

Let's think about it when you say, by the way, automated enforcement in people's minds, they might hear that as red light cameras, same or different could be there's a lot of there's a lot of different technologies that are that are starting to come up now in a lot of different cities, that are using them, I just feel is inevitable to me that we're going to something more automated, kind of uniformly across society, aren't we?

Well, I think when it comes to traffic, the options are either have something automated or have nothing at all.

Yeah, I mean that that seems to be the decision that's going to have to be struck at some point.

I'll tell you about an interesting conversation I had with, leadership in Dayton, Ohio, which is probably the the most similar city to Rochester that has a pretty mature automated enforcement.

system.

And they actually have I think it's 12 mobile or mobile units that move to different locations.

So they're cameras, but they're not they're not adorned to that particular light.

And then what the city does is every three months they change the locations and they announce publicly, hey, here's the 12 new locations for these cameras.

And by the way, for the first, I don't know what it is.

For the first month, there's no fine.

There's no fine for the ticket is a slap on the wrist and a letter to your house letting you know that we caught you going too fast.

I like that.

And then.

And then in another three months, the locations change again.

And you know what this does?

It starts to change people's behavior when you get to that corner, you know, okay, I can't just fly through this light anymore.

And it's not just punitive.

It doesn't make people feel like it's a money grab, even though I know they need revenue.

It feels like this.

We're actually trying to change behavior.

Don't.

That's the goal.

Don't even say the second clause.

Even though everybody needs revenue, this will not work.

If it's anything remotely like a revenue source or a cash grab.

Okay, this is about changing behavior and changing behavior.

Will will include some educational opportunities, some no fee tickets and some tickets.

All those things have to be and we have to work on it together as a community.

Okay.

There was a just there was a wave of red light camera introduction back in, you know, about the same time hours went in, which is 2011, you know, and, and in many, many cases, the implementation was actually led by some corporations that really had their hands in the pockets of, of the motorists of the community.

there's been some, in some cases, some tremendous, graph.

There's a whole series of conversations in Chicago, for example, about the company that was installing was which is actually the same company that installed the cameras here.

So the thought that this was about making money, that's not in people's imagination.

So really, so that criticism is a criticism, absolutely valid.

But there's absolutely no reason for that to be true.

But the other thing I'll point out about the program we had in Rochester, that was that, you know, we ran for five years, 2011, 2016 is, the study that was done show that, you know, for example, that, right angle crashes with injuries declined 37% because of the cameras, or at least this with with the data set, that, collisions.

in those in the intersections with cameras, declined by, in 20 out of the 32 or, I'm sorry, 20 out of the 32 total.

intersections, eight of them had actually went up a little bit.

Some rear end collisions, increased.

But but the the data from our own experience that, is conclusive that red light cameras, reduced injuries, reduced collisions, and data from across the country confirms that there's a lot of good information, good research out there that says that automated enforcement, both speed cameras and red light cameras, actually works okay.

Anything you want to add from the city perspective, David, on how imminent this is, because people are hearing this going, I guess we're getting red light cameras back.

And again, not the same way.

When Council member Gruber says it has to be designed about behavior, behavior, behavior that's not the same thing.

So don't take this conversation said, well, we're getting the same thing back.

It's not the same thing, but are we getting a flavor of it back?

And think of the future.

I think we know that enforcement is an absolutely critical part of the Vision Zero initiative.

It's going to have to be really integral to it.

it's certainly not the only piece.

We are pretty early and looking at what exactly it's going to look like.

You know, Council Member Gruber mentioned, there's a lot of different technology that maybe wasn't available back when we originally had red light cameras and technology has improved.

So it's not just red light cameras.

It's, looking at automated speed enforcement that's looking at, school bus, stop arm cameras, which, you know, there's already, some effort on that here in Monroe County.

but, you know, in terms of exactly what it's going to look like, we're pretty early, suffice to say, I think doing it in an equitable and fair and transparent way is, is really the key.

Do you think?

You know, go ahead, guys, I want to make a couple of points because I the last thing I'd want is for people to think that the Vision Zero plan is, is a plan about automated enforcement.

You can go to Rock Vision Zero, there's a ten point plan.

That's one point of it.

But I want to I want to make four.

I want to add four quick thoughts about this.

Number one, there will be nothing about automated enforcement until there's significant community engagement.

And it will start with the Vision Zero task force.

But there will have to be multiple forums and multiple public hearings and opportunities for people to weigh in.

But a couple of things I just want to counter, not counter, but just add to Kent Kent's point about what's different now versus then the technology back then when we did it the first time was, not wonderful.

I remember getting a ticket.

Remember I was not in council when we had red light cameras.

So I had nothing to do with being able to fight for different technology.

But I got a ticket because I was two inches over the white line, I stopped, I did a complete stop, but I was over the white line.

So I got a camera that was not I was not endangering anyone.

There was no dangerous behavior there.

And countless people got tickets for reasons like that or doing us, maybe a stop, but it felt like to the camera was a rolling right turn.

The technology is leagues better now than it was then.

Secondly, we did not have our own, traffic violations bureau back then.

So people were regularly having to plea this down in a way that was not particularly, equitable for city residents.

and I think the final point I would add is that the state actually passed a law.

I forget exactly what it's called, but essentially, you're no longer allowed to have your driver's license suspended for, for unpaid fines.

Everyone is entitled to have a payment plan, I believe a no interest payment plan to make sure that people who require driving to get to and from work are not hurt by having a $100 ticket open.

Those are all things that are different now from back then.

So we're going to have to have a lot of communication about this and make it clear to people, this is not what it was back then.

It's not a cash grab.

But I cannot say this enough.

We can't we will not have behavior change unless we do something different about enforcement.

And I recall being on your show probably two years ago, or maybe a year and a half ago with my good friend Evan Lowenstein, who was doing a strong town's, piece here.

And we were talking about, my good friend Edgar Santa Cruz, who who got killed by a driver.

And there was all this conversation about design.

And this is a person who flew through as a red light, going 20 miles above the speed limit on park Avenue and killed Edgar and his dog, Rosie.

There was nothing that was going to prevent that from happening, except getting people to change their behavior, that you can just drive like it's the Daytona 500 all the time.

Design doesn't change that.

Education doesn't change that.

We need laws that make people understand that behavior is completely unacceptable.

All right.

So listeners, I'm going to welcome some of your feedback as we go throughout this hour.

And I already have some emails.

844295 talk.

It's 8442958255263 WXXI.

If you call from Rochester 2639994 or email the program at connections at six.

I uh.org we are talking about Vision Zero.

Absolutely read what the City of Rochester has put forward here, because what we're talking about are components of it or ideas of it.

but it is not just one thing.

It is many, many different things.

hopefully working cohesively, toward safer streets.

But I'm going to read an email.

I know this is going to it's probably going to offend some people.

And Charles emailed the program.

He knows I disagree with this, but he you know, I Charles, has a right to feel this way.

And I frankly, we hear from listeners who feel this way every time we talk about road safety.

So let me read it.

Charles says natural selection would do the trick eventually.

There's a concept that these plans don't seem to understand.

If you ride a bike improperly, if you don't use the sidewalk, if you cross the street wherever and whenever you feel like it, you are accepting that risk for anything that happens to you and any accidents that occur are your fault.

Being a pedestrian or riding a bike is not a shield.

You have an obligation to obey the rules of the road as well.

Well, what does Charles say to the guy who gets T-boned by the guy who blew through a red light?

The people who get hurt in those in accidents are the are the people who are going across the street.

And, you know, you're you're you're just driving across the street and somebody blows through a red light and hits the side, the side collisions are deadly.

you know, rear ends are biker partly because of airbags, patrol because of improved, you know, car design are nowhere near as dangerous.

Those T-Bones are terrible, says Charles.

how do you help the people who get T-Bone?

David?

You know, I think ultimately there is a great burden upon those of us who are driving around in a vehicle that weighs several tons, to to protect the safety of people who are more vulnerable on the street.

And that includes pedestrians and cyclists, people with disabilities, and people who ride the bus.

and that's an awful lot of people here in the city of Rochester.

1 in 4 households don't have access to a personal vehicle.

I think that's a statistic.

You probably heard a lot in some neighborhoods.

It's 1 in 2 households.

so it's a just a tremendous number of people in our city.

And I think, it is certainly not the case that every person who's been hit by a car and seriously injured or killed was doing something wrong.

And I think that's a framing we need to try to move away from Mitch.

So ridiculous comment.

I could say a lot more about how ridiculous it is, but we have a lot more things to talk about.

Well, I think it should.

You know, persisted David.

Talk about and Mitch, the the kind of passive changes to the to the roadways that vision zero vision.

So you know, for example, you got snow.

I got a big snow pile right near the intersection.

You know, the drivers can't see pedestrians.

Pedestrians can't see cars.

if you've got parking that goes right up to the edge of the, of the corner.

Same thing if you've got bad lighting.

a lot of things have been done in New York City.

The very effective.

They've got a marvelous from just different designs.

Just different designs.

Yeah.

Devin.

Yeah, it's certainly not the case that that what we're talking about here is sort of conjecture.

And we're thinking that it's going to improve outcomes.

We know from other cities that it can improve outcomes.

And it has if it's done right and it has to be it really has to be all hands on deck.

I can't I really can't stress this enough.

I was talking to, a, an avid bicyclist, a bike commuter yesterday as a matter of fact, who told me that up on East Avenue near Wegmans over there, there's one of those, you know, speed speed detectors or a radar that.

Is that was placed directly in the middle of the bike lane.

Now, I have not gotten to the to the, into the weeds yet to figure out was that the city that put it up?

Was it the state that put it up?

Is it the county that put it up?

It could have been a number of of entities.

But we we also have to like remember, these are not just decisions made.

These are not huge big picture decisions about enforcement or speed limits.

It's also about like, how do we actually put things on the road or in the roads.

Where do we put signage?

How do we develop raised, crosswalks?

These are all small things that touch police fire desks where David works and a whole bunch of other, parts of our city.

Everyone has to be on board that we want to build a safer culture, and much of that is relatively cheap.

there's some really big stuff we could do, but a lot of that is cheap.

Well, Roger writes to say, regarding culture, it says America is a car centric society.

Cars come first and pedestrians at best, stay out of the way.

I was stationed in England for two years and it's completely different.

It is emphasized that pedestrians always come first cars at best.

Be careful.

I always felt safe, even in car heavy London, but if I was on foot I was reasonably safe.

So I mean, I I've only spent four days in London and but certainly when you, when you go to European cities, it does feel different.

I mean I don't I think that's again not conjecture.

Some of it's culture, some of it might be design, some might be laws.

You're right.

It could be a combination of all those things.

So Council Member Gruber's point it's it's this multidisciplinary approach that that's not strictly focused on infrastructure.

Infrastructure is really important.

And that's that's the part that that I work on and that I'm passionate about.

But it also involves all these other things that we're talking about.

I would say you don't have to cross the Atlantic to find cities where it's better to be a pedestrian or a cyclist, though, you know, I, I moved to Rochester from the Boston area, which I don't think is anybody's idea of, of, of a Mecca for pedestrians and cyclists, per se.

But boy, do do cars actually yield to pedestrians and crosswalks there in a way that they don't here.

And part of that is enforcement.

I, I just I can't quite describe the difference when you walk up to a crosswalk and actually see a vehicle stop, as opposed to just cruising by, and you're sort of looking for an opening to scoot across.

Well, part of your job is figuring out what do we have the resources for?

What do we have the community buy in for?

What's achievable?

Oh, what is like the far end of the.

If David Riley had his mad scientist lab of infrastructure and design that right now, you think that's not happening now, but you actually think would make us safer and you'd like to see happen now, the show has taken a very exciting turn.

I think a lot of what we're doing already in the city is very promising.

The challenge is always resources to take it to scale.

So, you know, on West Main Street right now we have a project under construction that is that is doing a road diet.

So we're reducing the number of lanes, through there.

because, you know, the traffic studies show it's not really necessary for motor vehicle traffic.

narrowing the roadway, is shown to help reduce speeds, crossing a narrower road is a lot more comfortable for a pedestrian.

we're looking at, you know, protected bike lanes.

And by protected, I mean they're physically separated from vehicle traffic.

And different ways.

We have some already that are that are great examples here in the city where we're looking at ways we can build them more flexibly with different kinds of materials.

So, you know, in West Maine, we're using some concrete barriers we haven't used before that will separate bikes from from motor vehicle traffic, but it's not necessarily as costly as, as building this whole separate cycle track behind the curve.

so I think we're already working on really exciting things.

We have a number of really exciting projects coming down the line, with additional planning and demonstrating different kinds of materials we can use for these kinds of interventions.

I think the challenge is just always figuring out how we can how we can, take it across every quadrant of the city.

Council member Gruber.

Yeah.

I just want to point to what what I would call the the moonshot and the Vision Zero plan is the is the ninth point, which is about bus rapid transit on Lake Avenue.

I'm not going to do the best job of explaining bus rapid transit with my words because it's really something you should people should look at.

But if you just if you just search bus rapid transit, the FFT actually has it has a very good, page on this and go look at what bus rapid transit is.

It's essentially having an elevated platform and making our making bus transit easier.

And at the same time, it could turn into a road diet for Lake Avenue, which is this is the perfect marriage because Lake Avenue, while it's our most dangerous street for pedestrians, it is also our most our our number one traffic street.

For busses.

It's our highest, it's our highest density of users is taking that particular route.

So if we can find this marriage of being able to reduce the traffic on lake and improve the bus capability and reliability and frequency, that's a win.

BRT costs a lot of money.

I will say, we have we're very fortunate to have Senator Cooney being the chair of the Transportation Department.

That's a huge opportunity for us, to leverage that.

I know that Senator Cooney is really interested in this kind of work.

So that's that's kind of a moonshot.

And I also want to say we've sort of already, achieved a moonshot, which is that we have gotten rid of half the inner loop, and we're about to get rid of the other half.

I shouldn't say about to.

We will at some point get rid of the other half.

Absolutely.

we have the the funding reserve.

That is a huge, huge win that 15 years ago would have been an impossible thought.

People would have always.

You know, I remember people with cancer talking about how it was the new surround our city, this highway that made it really impossible to traverse one side or the other.

Half of it's gone.

It's a it's a dense, walkable, bikeable part of our city, and the other half is going to be gone in no time.

So you're saying don't lose sight of that achievement?

That's a real achievement?

Yes.

The only people who lose sight of that achievement are people.

Are Rochester.

Anywhere else you go to talk about urban planning?

People say, I can't believe what you've been able to do in Rochester.

Was it was it Jim?

Mark McIntosh?

McIntyre was the the city engineer ten years ago on this program.

And somebody called in and they were talking about the inner loop and he said, you can't get rid of the inner loop.

I use it every day.

And nobody else is ever on Earth.

Exactly.

It was it was one of the best phone calls we ever got on this program.

before we take our only break, Kent Gardner, if people want to attend tomorrow, it's the vision zero.

Reducing Death and Injury on Rochester Streets Forum, hosted by the Rochester Beacon, 9 a.m. at the Central Library.

People can still register and attend.

Absolutely.

There's still some seats left.

It's not a big hall.

It's only seats 150.

So you know, we're over, you know, over 100 now.

So, you know, if you want to, you know, go to you, you know, the Rochester beacon.org website.

You can find registration information there and great discussions and information come in tomorrow when we come back from the only break of this hour.

Some of your questions and feedback as well for our guests, that includes Kent Gardner, who is a member of the editorial staff at the beacon, former chief economist at KG, Dr. Mitch Gruber is a member of Rochester City Council.

David Riley, principal transportation specialist with the city.

We're right back.

I'm Evan Dawson, host of connections.

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This is connections.

I'm Evan Dawson.

I'll get to your emails for the end of the hour.

I want to hit with David Riley from the city.

Some of what's happening now and first and foremost, when it comes to how to get this stuff done, sometimes we know there's federal funds.

Is anything held up or possibly blocked by what's going on in Washington with the new presidential administration.

So we've had some really great successes in the last year or so and pursuing and and securing some major federal grants for, safety improvements and to doing, you know, additional detailed planning and demonstration projects that'll help us implement what we're talking about here.

that includes, safe streets and roads for all grant, that we were awarded last year, over $23 million, which is one of the biggest awards in New York State at the time.

to to look at safety improvements on four major corridors that are flagged as safety concerns and our our active transportation plan that we we completed a couple of years ago.

We just identify them, David.

Those were.

Yeah.

that's, East Main Street between, the former inner loop, Union Street and and Goodman Street, Lexington Avenue on the west side of the city, North Clinton Avenue on, on the northeast side and Chili Avenue, on the on the southwest.

So, obviously the, the I think we all know the, the federal funding landscape is, is changing rapidly.

we don't, you know, really have final answers on exactly what's going on.

But we're watching it closely, but certainly with with concern and, but but hope that we're still able to make these critical investments for the city.

so it sounds like you're hopeful, but there could be some problems.

We'll have to see, you know, where it we're talking with, with advocates and folks in the transportation world.

And there's certainly some, some concern, I would say, and I just want to point out about those those dollars largely came because of the, incredible work that David and his colleagues and the in our engineers.

everyone all the way down works on there.

But it also came because we had a Vision Zero commitment.

it meant a lot around the time we were applying for these dollars.

And as soon as we had the Vision Zero commitment, Senator Schumer called and twice came to press conferences on North Clinton, right at Saint Michael's Church to say, hey, I saw your plan in Rochester and I want to deliver.

And, Senator Schumer, had the was in a different position to deliver, before January of 2025.

But he delivered, and I'm very confident that he's going to make sure we get the money that was promised to us.

Okay.

now, David, when it comes to priority actions that the city is undertaking now here, what do you want listeners to understand about what is happening?

And so it relates to Vision Zero.

I thought I'd just run kind of quickly on the ten priority action.

Great Council member Gruber mentioned to number one, establishing the Rock Vision Zero task force.

So that's, a diverse committee of, community members, from a lot of different organizations.

it's Reconnect Rochester, it's black girls to bike.

But it's not just folks who are focused on transportation.

It's it's common ground health.

It's Rochester refugee Resettlement services.

It's it's a lot of different organizations, with with an interest in this issue as well as really a great team of folks from all across the different departments of the city.

number two, traffic safety, champions or traffic safety Education Campaign that's doing some of the public outreach that we've been talking about, that public education to, to, to and getting input from the public as well about how to do this, about, creating public Buy-In.

with what we're trying to accomplish here.

number three is the Safe Speed City initiative, implementing a 25 mile an hour speed limit here in the city.

We've been talking quite a bit about that one, but, pedestrian priority zones, working with our partners at the county and the state and, internally here at the city to use street design, to use traffic calming to try to lower speeds in critical pedestrian areas.

safe crossing city initiative, looking at, how we approach crosswalks, how often we provide them, looking at things like signals, raising crosswalks wherever possible.

number six, our bike network continuing to build out a bicycle spine network that's high comfort bike facilities that people of all ages and abilities can use on major corridors across the city.

as well as doing other bike improvements, on other streets.

Number seven winter safe streets, doing, getting our arms around the cost and the staff and equipment needs to to provide a higher level of, snow removal on sidewalks, on bike facilities, on trails.

Rochester, I think, already does a great deal more than a lot of cities do to remove sidewalk, snow and ice.

But, we want to understand, if we were to take it to another level, what would that require?

Number eight, automated traffic enforcement, which we have talked a lot about today.

Number nine is that focus on Lake Avenue and looking at the feasibility of implementing bus rapid transit there, as well as, thinking about some of the other streets while we're working on Lake Avenue, that are in our high injury network.

And finally, the Rock Vision Zero report.

So in issuing a comprehensive report, on outcomes, being transparent with the community about here's what we're tracking, here's where we think we're going to move the needle.

Are we help hold us accountable.

Right.

It's and it's all there.

People can read for themselves.

Share it.

Take a look online.

Yep.

And if you go to City of rochester.gov/vision zero you will find all those actions detailed there.

All right a lot of feedback and I'm gonna get it through as much as we can here.

Peter says, it says, there's an agency dot missing from the conversation.

Here are some examples of actual conversations with the region five head of Dot head.

He said.

I questioned the pedestrian lights at a busy intersection.

I suggested the push to receive a signal to cross lights.

I'd seen both middle schoolers and seniors wait, wait, wait, and finally go against the light.

I suggested that perhaps the former lights, which automatically would switch from walk to don't walk automatically, but the dot said the lights are state of the art and we just need a lot of retraining.

He says dot has made Paved shoulders essentially another lane for turns and passing on the right.

it's also questioning a high speed limit in an area and suggesting a reduction.

The response was there would just be more many more people speeding if we reduce the speed limit.

So Peter saying that he's kind of banging his head against the wall with some of the stuff, the shoulder turning into a turn lane, that kind of thing.

What do you make of that, David?

You know, I can't speak for for D.O.T.

region five.

We're lucky to be here and dot region four, and they really do work closely with us on a lot of different projects.

but but they're going to be a really critical partner in this initiative.

Lake Avenue, from Lisle Avenue up to route 104, is owned by, and operated by New York State D.O.T..

So they're going to have to be a really critical piece of that conversation about bus rapid transit and what we're doing to try to improve Lake Avenue.

I know I will say and, in favor of D.O.T., they are looking at, doing a study on, Mount Airy Boulevard.

That's another, corridor they own and operate here in the city.

A ways to try to improve that.

that's coming up in the near future.

So, yeah, we do work closely with them.

And so I want to give a quick shout out to, one of the real, leaders in this work locally.

Doctor Scott McCray.

Scott gave me a copy of a book a couple months ago called killed by a Traffic Engineer.

by West Marshall.

I really encourage people to consider reading it, and it it gets into a lot of what the what the, reader sense you have.

And the reality is that we do have, I don't doubt David's, confidence and optimism in the folks that he works with.

And I'm sure there's some really wonderful people at D.O.T..

But I do think that we have department of Transportation that are, in fact, car centric and thinking about how do we move people from here to there quickly, more than they're thinking about safety and more than they're thinking about kind of the fabric of, of of how this, these streets kind of knit together.

And we need to change that.

We need to change the culture of how D.O.T.

thinks about this type of work.

And I think one of the ways we do that is by developing our own kind of plan and vision and culture as a city, and that again, that's what Vision Zero is intending to do.

We have to stick with it for years and be diligent and continue to update it and refresh it if this is going to work, but we need to bring them along with us.

Well, one thing that's going to be something that we're going to have to all see if it happens, is Senator Cooney, as the chair of transportation, as Mitch mentioned, has a very ambitious view that we don't just have to have a car centric culture?

Well, I don't think Senator Cooney says we're not going to be a car centric culture.

I think he's saying that infrastructure is more achievable than a lot of cynical American politicians have said.

It is, and he's very serious about that.

And we'll see.

but let me continue with your feedback here.

Adrian says, whenever we talk about transportation going from A to B, we need to talk about land use policy, like zoning, which determines where A and B are located.

If zoning A and B far away from each other with large minimum lot sizes, parking requirements, etc., then walking and biking become less attractive even with great infrastructure.

Can you ask Mr. Gruber and Mr. Riley to talk a little bit about Rochester's ongoing zoning alignment project?

That's from Adrian.

Sure.

so the zoning alignment project is the rewrite of our zoning code, which is underway right now.

it's been, at this point, a multi-year process as it should be.

It's, it's kind of a once in a lifetime thing.

We haven't updated the zoning code since, Bill Johnson was mayor, so there's a lot of work to do.

And we have to think about, traffic and pedestrian safety.

with the zoning code.

we also, you know, I Adrian brings up a great point, and it may be that there's going to be some incongruity between what the zoning code says and what Vision Zero is all about.

The zoning code, in my mind, in my estimation, has to be about, creating more density, creating more opportunities to build, both housing and businesses here.

And that is oftentimes going to be, make some of the work.

We're talking about Vision Zero a little bit more challenging, but that's why we have to have a really strong foundation and the ability to move pretty quickly.

As a city.

I'd just briefly add, you know, the zoning, alignment project comes out of our, Rochester 2030 for our comprehensive plan, which is really strong on transportation and dealing with a lot of the issues we're talking about here.

And I think the zoning code update as well aligned with those goals.

thank you, Adrian, I am going to read a couple of comments that are representative.

We've got a lot on.

You're not going to believe this.

The subject of, automated enforcement.

You don't say, I know, I know, I want to say again here, everything that's being discussed about a possible future automated enforcement is not just a return to the ten, 15 years ago.

Red light cameras to different thing.

So get that out of your head first.

It's not exactly the same thing.

Now, Wendy says, I paid twice for my rolling right turn habit with red light cameras, and I want those cameras back because my son was attending Franklin in the city, and the driving behavior at Hudson and Norton was so much safer when cameras were in place.

So Wendy said, I got ticketed twice.

Good.

Bring him back.

Gary, more cynical, says, more dystopian rule and more Big Brother enforcement only because we don't exist.

The enforce the existing rules.

So, you know, dystopian.

I don't I don't understand Gary's point.

It's actually about enforcing the existing rules.

He's saying that if you got to do it with cameras everywhere, that's dystopian.

That's big brother.

Well, if he's got a better idea, he should he should propose hire more police.

yeah.

I mean, a feasible idea.

Kent Kent will write the story.

Thank you very.

Just let Kent know.

I would I would say, you know, these cameras that that we're looking at, to my understanding, are not about tracking individuals or, you know, it's about it's about the movement of the vehicle.

It's not about, Yeah.

Go ahead.

Yeah.

I mean, actually, one of the one of the great questions and challenges about automated enforcement is that, it is not about, face surveillance and facial identification.

It's about following the vehicle.

So I think one of the big questions that everyone has to answer is, all right, this vehicle got a ticket, but, the owner of the vehicle can say with confidence they were not behind the wheel.

They were at work.

And it was actually their daughter was actually their friend or their neighbor who who borrowed the car.

You know, those are the the details that have to be figured out and sorted out.

But it's not about adding to a surveillance state.

And I think there's actually ways to very definitively state that up front.

You know, my my wife's car got two of those rolling right on red tickets deserved.

the car was completely complicit.

Kent, before we lose the our you in a past career have done plenty in analyzing, certain certain whether certain certain things are feasible, fit within budgets, fit within priorities and everything that that you see that we've been talking about these ten points, vision zero.

Do you view it putting on all the different hats in your career as something that if we prioritize correctly, we can do a lot of this?

We can do an awful lot of this?

Yeah, I think that there are a lot of things you can do that, that are relatively affordable within our current budgets.

one of the beauties of automated enforcement is if you don't get carried away, it at least pays for itself.

you know, you do have a significant capital investment.

And I think it's only fair that that the people who are who pay fines, as a way to and sent them to drive more safely that those fines go to pay for the system that encourages them to drive more safely.

So I think there are a lot of things that are affordable.

Some of the grander plans that we'd like to see happen in the long run.

I mean, those are I mean, what's the amount we're talking about for replacing the second half of the inner loop?

I mean, the combined total is it's a staggering amount of money.

So those are harder.

but one of the things that the city of New York did in terms of, improvements, forgotten the road improvement plan.

I mean, they show, incidentally, that, they argue in the report that they did that the that the simple things they did not the massive capital investments actually reduced, fatalities by 25% overall.

and this is not about transportation enforcement.

Not only that.

What's interesting about this is that because they targeted those improvements in low poverty, in high poverty areas, the reduction in the very high poverty areas was actually 34%.

So I think this is there's a tremendous amount that can be done.

And again, it's it's simple stuff, making sure the people, the pedestrians can see the cars and the cars can see the pedestrians, that's not that hard.

And rocket science.

So the vision zero for them reducing death and injury in Rochester streets is tomorrow morning starting at 9 a.m. at the Rochester Beacon.

Rochester beacon.org the website.

That's right.

You can still register.

They would love to see you there at the Central Library before Mitch Gruber gets to that, the council member you've got 30s to tell us.

Where are you going next today?

You got an oh, yeah.

Thank you.

So the webinar today.

Yeah.

So at 530, I'm joining, Mayor Evans to do a webinar on our water system.

again, when I think about water and I think about our street safety, there's so much at the federal level that people are unsure about and uncertain about.

These are things that we have control over.

We as a city, you're the people who you elect locally have control over.

We're trying to talk about all the great things that have been done and will continue to be done.

So join us for that webinar at 530.

You can sign up on the city website and join us for the Beacon's event tomorrow.

It'll be a great sign, I think.

Well, thank you all for being here.

Council Member Mitch Gruber, member of Rochester City Council.

Thank you for making time for the thanks for having me.

David Riley, principal transportation specialist with the city.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Kent Gardner, member of the editorial staff at the Rochester Beacon, former chief economist at the center for Governmental Research and chief speed limit curmudgeon.

I like the I like to put that on my business card.

If I had a business card, I wanted to really argue with you on this, and I think you got me.

All right.

I think you won me over on that.

I encourage people to come tomorrow, and if you don't get a chance to register, that's all right.

We'll love.

We'll we'll put chairs in the back.

We'll squeeze in.

Just be there at 9 a.m. tomorrow at the library.

Thank you for being here from all of us at connections.

Thank you for watching and listening.

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