The Overhead Wire Daily | April 9th, 2024 | Public Safety Officers and Street Safety

Last week we posted a very popular piece about how fire departments should be rethinking how they approach safety to encompass more than just fire safety in buildings.  Since they are often the first responders in car collisions and calls about homelessness, their prescriptions for urban policy might change. This means thinking about what it means to have safer streets for everyone, not just themselves.

So I was struck by this thought again when I was reading the Texas Monthly piece on the new Mayor of Houston John Whitmire, who on a ride along with the chief of police just blindly listened to his safety musings on a recently completed road diet. The mayor didn’t bother asking who the safety improvements were for or why the police chief believed it made the street more dangerous in his mind.

I imagine this happens quite often. Public safety officials such as fire and police are held in high regard and often hold a lot of political sway. But we know from recent political actions they aren’t experts in street design or transportation policy.

Maybe that’s on us to help them understand the speeds that kill pedestrians on streets or how safe systems work. But it’s also frustrating that it doesn’t seem like they’ve even tried to learn. If I were them I might ask why more people were dying in collisions and why the US is so far behind other comparable countries in this regard. I’m certain we’ll get there eventually, but there’s a lot of work to do.

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