Why Rochester, New York, Is a Leading Example in Crash Response
Editor's Note: The first part of this story originally appeared in the "Beyond Blame" report released in October 2024.
At first glance, South Goodman Street in Rochester, New York, doesn’t appear to be an example of unsafe design. It features wide sidewalks, a mix of low-rise retail and residential buildings, and controlled intersections with crosswalks and overhead lighting.
Yet, on December 22, 2022, Edgar Santa Cruz and his dog Rosie were struck and killed by a car while crossing South Goodman Street at an intersection with Park Avenue. The crash occurred at 5:51 p.m. on a rainy day at a four-way intersection with a traffic light.
An investigation by local law enforcement determined that Santa Cruz entered the intersection with a green light and a walk signal and that the driver of the car ran a red light before making fatal contact. Authorities deemed the driver’s actions the cause of the crash and charged him with various traffic-related violations resulting in death.
But Evan Lowenstein, the friend and colleague of Santa Cruz who reached out to Strong Towns for help analyzing the crash, wanted a deeper examination of the causes to be conducted and action taken to prevent future tragedies. A panel including Strong Towns staff, traffic engineers, city of Rochester staff, and friends and neighbors of the victim held the 2023 session.
Participants immediately found it striking that the scene of the crash was so different from what safety advocates and planning professionals typically consider a dangerous scene, such as a suburban arterial in which high-speed car traffic meshes with other road users.
However, when the expert panel dug deeper, it found several elements that would endanger people walking or cycling. The street connected to a state road and interstate highway, resulting in through traffic inappropriate for a residential neighborhood. Lowenstein conducted a radar gun study of vehicle speeds in the corridors around the crash site and found that 54% of drivers traveled above the posted 30 mph limit, with 4% going above 40 mph, a speed almost always fatal to pedestrians. The sidewalks had outdated curb cuts that reduced protection from cars rounding corners. In addition, the overhead lighting was placed in a way that failed to highlight the silhouettes of people and obstacles in a driver’s path.
This investigation showed how site-specific and fine-grained the elements leading up to a crash can be, as well as the necessity for local officials and leaders to be closely involved in evaluating causes and seeking changes.
The panel prepared a specific set of recommendations based on their analysis of the crash site and surrounding neighborhood. These recommendations included lowering local speed limits from 30 mph to 25 or 20 mph, trying new low-cost configurations to reduce road width, and reconfiguring curbs and intersections to fit revised ADA standards.
Participants in this Crash Analysis Studio generally had praise for Rochester officials (some of whom participated in the session) as being committed to improving safety. They’re united in seeking a greater level of urgency at all levels of community and government in the wake of a fatal crash.
After the Studio
The city of Rochester is now rebuilding the intersection with high-visibility crosswalks and improved ADA-compliant curb design. The city has also created a checklist of similar safety enhancements to include in all scheduled remilling projects.
In addition, Monroe County, which includes Rochester, has added a first-in-state Community Traffic Safety Team with a mandate to solicit citizens’ complaints and concerns and then evaluate them to make specific improvements. The form includes spaces for citizens to report maintenance issues, locations with chronic speeding, and — in a move that Strong Towns hopes will be repeated across North America — “Crash Analysis."
Monroe County says that the multidisciplinary traffic safety team will include “local, state, and federal government partners, as well as non-governmental organizations such as faith-based organizations (FBO), community-based organizations (CBO), non-profit organizations (NPO), public-benefit corporations (i.e., public transportation), hospitals, and other interested stakeholders.”
The team will meet quarterly starting in January 2025 to identify dangerous roadways, sidewalks and intersections by publicly evaluating comments and concerns left by local residents. It will also proactively identify trouble spots before crashes. After analyzing each complaint, the safety team will outline “actionable steps to mitigate traffic hazards for both drivers and pedestrians,” as well as work with stakeholders to identify available state and federal grant programs to fund those steps.
Do you want to get your community on the path to safer streets? Join us tomorrow, January 15, at noon EST for a free webinar with the Vision Zero Network. Click here to register.
Ben Abramson is a Staff Writer at Strong Towns. In his career as a travel journalist with The Washington Post and USA TODAY, Ben has visited many destinations that show how Americans were once world-class at building appealing, prosperous places at a human scale. He has also seen the worst of the suburban development pattern, and joined Strong Towns because of its unique way of framing the problems we can all see and intuit, and focusing on local, achievable solutions. A native of Washington, DC, Ben lives in Venice, Florida; summers in Atlantic Canada; and loves hiking, biking, kayaking, and beachcombing.