This month we turn our focus to walking, biking, and rolling. Some refer to this as active transportation, others refer to it as being a vulnerable road user—regardless of what you call it, walking, biking, and rolling are essential components of our ability to get from point A to point B.
Most people have SOME elements of walking, biking, or rolling as part of their daily commute, even if only a small portion (e.g., walking from the house to the garage or the parking lot to the office). My own personal commute varies from time to time. Occasionally, I drive all the way into work and park in the building’s garage. Other times, I’ll drive to a transit station and take Metrorail downtown, then walk from the station to the office.
Whether you are using active transportation for commuting, running errands, or recreating, you should take steps to protect your personal safety. At our Annual Meeting in Philadelphia last summer, former SEPTA General Manager Leslie Richards gave the audience a singular action item: Don’t jaywalk—use crosswalks! It sounds so simple, but that one action could save many lives. There are countless actions that we take can when walking, cycling, or rolling to enhance our chances of avoiding catastrophes.
But there is a second piece to this, and that’s to have an environment that is designed to help maintain your personal safety. And that’s where our community of transportation professionals comes into play. It is our Duty of Care (see the January ITE Journal) to embed a culture of saving lives and creating healthy communities into everything we plan, design, and operate. I won’t get into the statistics, because we all know that pedestrian and bicycle fatalities are a significant problem—and it’s not getting any better. This troubles me because, in our industry, we are so keenly aware of the problems. We have so many tools in our toolbox, yet somehow things are getting worse.
Perhaps it’s appropriate then that ITE has put so much energy into developing our Safety Roadmap and Action Plan, because anything short of 180-degree culture change isn’t going to be enough. We can say that balancing financial, societal, mobility, political, environmental, and engineering needs is difficult—but safety must take precedence above all. That’s a hard pill to swallow for many, because flying in the face of political or societal will in today’s environment is a quick path to an unplanned change in careers.
ITE has a number of initiatives and activities that can help, and the Safety Roadmap and Action Plan expands upon those. We teach and provide resources for both people-centered and data-driven decision-making. We have technical guidance and industry collaboration around core areas of planning, engineering, and operations. ITE’s Districts and Sections have regular gatherings where our community of professionals can share best practices and encourage enhanced coordination. And our Student Chapters pave the way for future professionals to start out with the correct foundational culture right out of the gate.
Changing the safety culture relies on each transportation professional’s daily commitment to making safety the top priority. Every decision you make and action you take in your role can contribute to fostering safer transportation systems. So let’s make an extra effort to provide a safe environment for those walking, biking, and rolling. There is almost certainly going to be a time when you and your family will benefit from it.