WATSONVILLE — The Watsonville City Council moved forward with a plan Tuesday to improve pedestrian and traffic safety, and the decision could not have been more timely.
Just two hours before the meeting, and mere feet away from the council chambers, a bicyclist was seriously injured after he was struck by a pickup truck on Rodriguez Street.
Watsonville Police Sgt. Donny Thul said the male driver of a Chevrolet pickup truck was traveling westbound on Second Street when he stopped at the intersection at Rodriguez Street. While proceeding through the intersection after stopping, the driver, for unknown reasons, ran into the 62-year-old man riding his bicycle southbound on Rodriguez Street at about 4:30 p.m.
The man was flown to a Bay Area trauma center. He was listed in stable condition Wednesday afternoon.
The driver is cooperating with the investigation, Thul said, and drugs and alcohol do not appear to be a factor in the collision.
The incident underscores what has become a crisis not only for Watsonville, but nationwide.
Watsonville was ranked first in the number of pedestrians injured or killed among similar-sized cities in the state, according to a 2016 study by the California Office of Traffic Safety, the most recent statistics available.
A 2018 study from the Governors Highway Safety Association showed that pedestrian deaths in the United States are at a 25-year high, with roughly 6,000 people killed on the nation’s roadways. Pedestrian fatalities increased by 27 percent from 2007-2016, while all other traffic deaths decreased by 14 percent, the study reported.
“It’s not a list we are proud to be on,” said City Manager Matt Huffaker. “Watsonville is not the only community struggling with this trend. It has now become a public health epidemic.”
Despite infrastructure improvements, such as flashing beacon pedestrian lights throughout the city and other projects, the issue has not been alleviated.
According to Watsonville Police Chief David Honda, the city experienced 139 injury collisions, three of which were fatal, in 2017, which was a decrease over the previous year. Thanks to enforcement and education campaigns, which were funded by a grant from the OTS, the downward trend continued in the early part of 2018.
But it didn’t last.
Just a few months after crews wrapped up a project on Airport Boulevard between Freedom Boulevard and Pajaro Lane, which added new sidewalks and striping, a man was struck as he was crossing the road in November, later succumbing to his injuries.
On Dec. 24, a woman died after she was struck by a pickup while crossing Main Street at East Beach Street.
“In 2017, we started to see a downward trend,” Honda said. “We were looking at the same trend going into 2018, but at the end of the year we saw a huge spike in fatalities and injury accidents. We are at five fatalities, which is unacceptable.”
Huffaker said addressing pedestrian and bicyclist safety is one of the city’s top priorities for 2019, continuing last year’s enforcement, infrastructure improvements and education efforts.
“Despite these ongoing efforts, we continue to see unacceptable levels of pedestrian injuries over this past year,” he said. “The city can’t solve this problem on our own. We all need to take responsibility to solve this problem together. It’s not something that we can change overnight.”
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Street Smarts
In January 2018, the council adopted Vision Zero, an initiative first implemented in Sweden in the 1990s that acknowledges that traffic fatalities are preventable and aims to come up with solutions to achieve a zero death goal by 2030. San Jose, San Francisco, Los Angeles and other cities have also adopted Vision Zero, and Watsonville is the first in Santa Cruz County to do so.
To work toward that goal, on Tuesday, the council moved forward with a pedestrian and driver safety education campaign known as Street Smarts.
The campaign will include signage throughout the city, especially in the problem areas of Main Street, Freedom Boulevard and Airport Boulevard, advising both drivers and pedestrians to pay attention to their surroundings.
Those three areas will be also designated as “Pedestrian Safety Zones,” where police officers will take a “zero tolerance approach” to speeders.
“If you get pulled over, don’t expect just a warning,” Honda said.
Among other things, the plan will direct city officials to work with state legislators to pursue legislation that will allow Watsonville to reduce traffic speeds in certain areas.
Public Works Assistant Director Maria Esther Rodriguez said crews have been working on projects throughout the city, funded by Measure D, the 2016 voter-approved half-cent countywide sales tax, and Senate Bill 1, signed by then-Gov. Jerry Brown in 2017 that raises funds for transportation projects through a gas tax.
SB 1 is helping fund the $1.4 million Airport Boulevard project, where crews are currently reconstructing portions of the roadway and adding new sidewalks from Westgate Drive/Larkin Valley Road to Holm Road.
Measure D, over the past year, has funded such projects as flashing beacon lights at four intersections around the city, and bike and pedestrian safety training at schools, among other projects.
Councilman Felipe Hernandez said the city should not only focus on “green” bike lanes, but also pursue protected bike lanes that separate bicyclists from motorists.
“I think we are on the right path to reduce bike and pedestrian fatalities,” he said. “The faster we can do these infrastructure improvements, the faster we can reduce these fatalities in our community.”
Councilwoman Ari Parker said education is key to reaching “a lot of people,” especially younger students.
“It’s what we live every day, and we have to be cognizant when we drive, when we walk, when we ride our bicycle,” she said. “There’s so much to do on this, and through tragedy we are moving ahead.”
The plan is “just the beginning,” Mayor Francisco Estrada said.
“These are lifelong habits we have to develop,” he said. “We have to hold each other accountable.”
