vision zero

It’s just a matter of time until Mayor Michael Hancock officially adopts Vision Zero, a commitment to eliminate traffic deaths in a specific time frame. There’s money in the city budget to develop a plan, plus walking, biking, and transit advocates formed the Vision Zero Coalition in December to make sure that plan has teeth. What’s missing is … Continued

End-of-year lists are an inescapable part of the calendar flipping from December to January. Some of those serve to entertain, but this list serves to remind Mayor Michael Hancock, his Department of Public Works, and CDOT Executive Director Shailen Bhatt that 19 20 people were killed while walking and biking through the city in 2015. Half … Continued

Vision Zero, the goal of eliminating traffic deaths and serious injuries, has gained popularity across the country in recent years. But that doesn’t mean cities automatically live up to its foundational principles of slowing vehicle speeds with better street design, enforcement, and education. To make sure Denver’s iteration of Vision Zero has teeth, a group of advocates … Continued

Yesterday Streetsblog Denver published the first half of our interview with Shailen Bhatt, the head of Colorado’s Department of Transportation, in which he talked about CDOT’s changing role in a changing Denver. Bhatt isn’t your average DOT leader — or at least he doesn’t sound like one. He talks about complete streets a lot, and … Continued

Mayor Michael Hancock’s 2016 budget is a step in the right direction when it comes to streets and transportation. But it still falls far short of putting Denver on track to become a city where people can safely and conveniently get around without driving. It’s up to City Council members to influence and improve Hancock’s spending plan, and tonight you can weigh … Continued

Denver Public Works Transportation Director Crissy Fanganello told the City Council Tuesday that her agency will create a Vision Zero plan — a roadmap to eliminate traffic deaths — as long as the council approves the allocations in Mayor Michael Hancock’s 2016 budget. The news came during a presentation on DPW’s budget, which includes $350,000 to create the plan … Continued

Denver’s Inter-Neighborhood Cooperation, a group that represents about 100 neighborhoods throughout the city, just adopted a transportation platform [PDF] that petitions, among other things, for Vision Zero. The platform should send a message to Mayor Michael Hancock’s office: The city must acknowledge that traffic deaths and serious injuries are unacceptable and develop a Vision Zero strategy to prevent them. Here’s some pretty strong … Continued

Today Mayor Michael Hancock proposed his 2016 budget, giving a glimpse of what the city will prioritize next year. The document [PDF] places more importance on creating people-oriented streets than it has in previous years, but the investments don’t indicate a paradigm shift to a 21st-century transportation mindset. That idea is best illustrated in Hancock’s note to the public (the … Continued

The Denver medical examiner has completed an autopsy of Timothy Erickson, who was struck and killed last month while biking on Colorado Boulevard. The autopsy confirmed that Erickson was not impaired by drugs or alcohol when he was struck. Since Erickson was hit while biking against traffic, in violation of the law, the common knee-jerk reaction has been to … Continued