Here’s What It Takes To Get Speed Humps Approved on Just One Block
This article was originally published in Greater Greater Washington. It is shared here with permission.
4800 block of 7th St. NW from Sherman Circle. (Source: Aman George.)
On July 28, the Washington Post Editorial Board published a powerful editorial about the failures of street safety efforts in DC. It concluded by calling for the District to “be more aggressive in implementing new road designs — narrower lanes, bike lanes and other traffic-calming elements. Anything that will signal to drivers that the road is not a racetrack.”
As advocates for street safety with experience in local government, we wanted to illustrate the on-the-ground challenges of implementing this vision. DC today lacks the tools and leadership to move aggressively.
Petworth’s Sherman Circle is a beloved neighborhood park that hosts dozens of young children every day to play catch, ride bikes and scooters, and search for the perfect stick. It has also been the site of multiple terrifying car crashes in which speeding drivers lost control on their way into the Circle and drove straight into the park. So far, these drivers haven’t hit anybody, but that luck could run out any time.
Vehicle crashed in Sherman Circle in October of 2021. (Source: Zach Israel.)
Last year, we asked DC’s Department of Transportation (DDOT) to install speed humps on one block leading into the Circle. This block on a neighborhood street is unusually long, straight, and downhill, and has previously sent cars flying into Sherman Circle at high speeds.
After six months, DDOT tentatively agreed to install two speed humps on this block—but not without asking for community feedback first. DDOT heard from two residents who opposed the project, complaining about a speed hump’s effects on parking and road repairs, neither of which would be affected.
DDOT quietly halted the speed hump installation in the face of their “uncertainty” about community support. Instead, DDOT commissioned a speed study that found that over 40% of the cars on that block exceeded the speed limit, and that over the course of two days, 22 cars had reached speeds more than 10 mph over the speed limit (including one car traveling between 40–45 mph on a 20 mph neighborhood street).
But by DDOT’s standards, this level of speeding was insufficient to require traffic calming, particularly in the face of uncertain community support.
When we happened to notice that DDOT had withdrawn its speed hump plans, we tried to reinvigorate the project. We let constituents know about DDOT’s change in plans, and ultimately more than a dozen residents emailed DDOT and local representatives to confirm that the community did, in fact, support traffic calming measures on a dangerous street leading into a neighborhood park. The local Advisory Neighborhood Commission quickly passed a resolution reinforcing this message and calling upon DDOT to proceed with the installation, which DDOT has now, thankfully, recommitted to, though installation has not yet happened.
But even with DDOT’s re-reversal, this episode at Sherman Circle illustrates the challenges of actually taking the city’s Vision Zero goals seriously. Two residents with hazy opposition to traffic calming should not be able to derail safety measures with well-timed emails. It shouldn’t take concerted community mobilization and passage of an ANC resolution just to try to get speed humps on one block.
Not only is this approach bad for safety, but it also raises fairness concerns—many people and communities simply aren’t going (or able) to go through this much work for each incremental improvement. DDOT has previously acknowledged that highly reactive traffic safety systems can compound inequity by favoring those with the time, attention, and engagement with city services necessary to push for improvements.
Vision Zero is supposed to be about a safe systems approach to traffic, not leaving residents to wage block-by-block warfare in hyperlocal political spaces. DC knows how to design safer streets; what we lack today is the courage to build them. We can’t keep paralyzing Vision Zero by passing the buck downwards—the government needs to get more comfortable exercising leadership that matches our challenges.
Aman George is a Petworth resident currently serving as the ANC Commissioner for Single Member District 4D06.
Zach Israel previously served as an Advisory Neighborhood Commissioner in Petworth & Brightwood Park in 2021-22, representing Single-Member District 4D04. In his day job, he does advocacy work on behalf of local and county governments throughout the U.S.
On this episode of the Strong Towns Podcast, Chuck discusses safe streets advocacy with Amy Cohen, the co-founder and president of Families for Safe Streets.