The City of Sacramento is updating its Vision Zero Action Plan. I believe that the focus of the plan should be quick-build fixes to locations where fatalities have occurred or are likely to occur. These locations are primarily intersections of arterial streets. Local streets, and to some degree collector streets, if they were not designed for more traffic and higher speeds, are mostly not the location of crashes, and even less likely fatalities because motor vehicle speeds are lower. Arterials are the problem to be solved.

That said, I want to speak up again for an infrastructure fix that has the greatest potential for reducing motor vehicle traffic. Traffic diverters would usually be on local streets, sometimes on collector streets. As such, they don’t prevent serious crashes. But they do discourage driving, and so would indirectly reduce crashes on arterials, as there would be fewer motor vehicles on all roadways. Anything that can be done to reduce the number of, and length of, car trips, will reduce fatalities.

I’ve written about traffic diverters (which are technically called modal filters, but are commonly referred to as traffic diverters) before: Strong SacTown Street Design: Modal Filters, Streets for People traffic calming, walking policies for SacCity, and many other mentions in posts.

The diagram below is the the City of Sacramento Neighborhood Connections Plan, which includes the first photo. Though permanent traffic diverters, with concrete curbs and planting, are the desired state, quick-build temporary diverters have most of the safety and traffic calming effect at a fraction of the cost. Constraints: Since quick-build placement can be easily removed if they don’t work, a traffic study is NOT required. Emergency vehicles can easily and safely go around the diverter. Cost: The cost shown is for a permanent installation. A quick-build installation could probably be installed for $1000-2000.

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The second photo is of a traffic diverter in the northeast section of the central city, on D Street at 20th Street. The diverter allows bicyclists to pass through, which is why it is also called a modal filter. Note that it doesn’t prevent reckless driver behavior in the intersection (donuts), but it does filter reckless drivers out of D Street.