Author: Todd Scott, Executive Director

We gave the following testimony before the People’s Hearing held on June 27th at the Durfee Innovation Society in Detroit:

In the past 10 years, there have been over a quarter million reported traffic crashes on Detroit streets. 

1,265 people have died in these crashes. 74 fatalities were under 18 years old. 383 were vulnerable road users – pedestrians and bicyclists. African-Americans were roughly 76% of all fatalities.

Why are there so many deaths on Detroit streets?

It’s mostly due to the speed of vehicles. Higher speeds result in more crashes and higher injury severity. This is especially true for vulnerable road users, most notably youth and seniors.

One problem is newer vehicles have more horsepower and are getting larger, higher, and heavier. This is a federal issue that the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has been unwilling to address.

But the local issue is our street designs. Detroit’s road network was built for 2 million people. Then it built a freeway network and the population fell by 1.3 million. We now have an abundance of unnecessarily wide roads. They not only encourage speeding – and even drag racing – they are difficult to cross. They are Dangerous by Design. 

The most dangerous roads in Detroit are owned by the state and MDOT has been reluctant to fix them. Even when these roads are made safer, the state refuses to maintain the portions used by pedestrians and bicyclists. 

In fact, MDOT’s ADA Transition Plan falsely claims that the state somehow does not even own the sidewalks they’ve installed on their roads. 

So what are the solutions?

First, we need MDOT to be accountable for their streets. They don’t get to only maintain the portions for vehicles. These are state assets and MDOT needs to acknowledge this. They should not require local communities to maintain parts of state roads as a prerequisite for getting safer roads – and, yes, this is actually their policy.

Second, safer road designs must be the standard, not an option. The state needs to budget safety features into road projects from the beginning and not struggle to find additional funding later. 

Third, the state needs to set safety targets and prioritize their road funding to meet them. Today they simply have researches estimate how many people will die on Michigan roads and that’s their target. Some years these targets have been raised despite MDOT’s declared commitment to the Towards Zero Deaths. 

Fourth, the state needs to make public transit, walking, and biking a safe choice for everyone. This is the real solution to reducing transportation carbon emissions, but also for making our roads safer. Being on the bus with 20 others and a professional driver is a lot safer than 20 people in their own cars. People walking and biking rarely cause harm to others.

Finally, I must acknowledge that changes at the US DOT are handcuffing some of these safety efforts. The Transportation Secretary is restricting Detroit and other cities’ ability to remove unnecessary vehicle lanes, reduce speeding, and make our roads safer. It’s part of his Freedom to Drive Initiative. 

The best solution for that is to vote in the November 2028 presidential elections.