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December 2012 
Greetings!
It took over 50 years -- and billions of dollars -- for the Atlanta region to build infrastructure as auto-centric as what we have today. And it will take time and money for the region to create streets and sidewalks that are safer and more accessible for people who walk.  

Thanks to your support this year, PEDS' Campaign for Safe Sidewalks and Safe Routes to Transit Programs have helped government agencies recognize that current policies and funding practices are rigged against pedestrian safety. With your continued help in the year ahead, PEDS will prompt officials who say they want walkable communities to back their promises with funding and action.

Sincerely,
Sally's signature Donate!
Sidewalk repairs: how long must we wait?
At the sidewalk maintenance forum PEDS held in July, several Atlanta City Council members looked to the proposed regional transportation sales tax to help address the estimated $152 million backlog of broken sidewalks. The tax referendum failed, so it's time for elected officials to stop kicking the can down the road. 

During the fall, the City Council's Sidewalk Task Force met twice. Co-Chairs Natalyn Archibong and Carla Smith created four subcommittees to discuss issues and provide recommendations.

Last week, the Best Practices subcommittee agreed that elected officials need to address basic questions. In particular, what is a reasonable timeline for addressing the estimated $152 million backlog in broken sidewalks?

At the level the City is currently investing, it would take over a century to address the backlog.  Meanwhile, Atlanta residents are aging, and more and more people are expected to live into their eighties and beyond.

Please let your City Council representatives know that anything longer than 20 years is unacceptable. Concrete sidewalks are expected to need repairs after 30 years. This makes a timeline greater than 30 years ludicrous.


Subcommittee chairs don't want to study the issue to death or allow the City Council to use the task force as a stall tactic. With your help, the ball will soon be back in elected officials' court. We'll keep you posted on opportunities to help them make the right decisions.
Funding pedestrian safety improvements: whose responsibility?
The Federal Highway Administration wants transportation agencies to increase their use of proven safety countermeasures, including median refuge islands, HAWK signals and road diets. With support from the FHWA, staff at PEDS researched barriers to installing these low-cost safety improvements.   

Road with median refuge island
At workshops in Atlanta this fall, Michael Ronkin, one of the world's leading experts on designing for pedestrian safety, said "the median island is the number one safety improvement . . . for crossing a street." Installing islands reduces the risk of pedestrian crashes by 39 percent. Compared to traffic signals or sidewalks, median islands are also quite cheap.  

Despite that,
lack of funds continues to block cost-effective improvements. Andy McBurney, PEDS' Safe Routes to Transit Project Manager, and PEDS CEO Sally Flocks met recently with Georgia Department of Transportation officials to recommend increased investment in refuge islands. Projects funded with federal gas tax dollars require extensive environmental impact studies, GDOT engineers responded. This means federal funds are rarely appropriate for installing median islands or other low-cost safety projects.

  
Elected officials know this. Please join us in asking local and state agencies to budget for low-cost safety improvements.  As with sidewalk maintenance, a large number of low-cost improvements nearly always adds more value to a community than a small number of ribbon-cutting projects. 


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PEDS is a member-based advocacy group dedicated to
making metro Atlanta safe and accessible for all pedestrians.
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