Transportation activists say the crisis should be treated as a public health emergency
An 11-year-old boy. A county librarian and mother of two. A 26-year-old living in an RV with his dad.
The July Portland Bureau of Transportation, or PBOT, budget advisory committee meeting began by reading the names of people killed in vehicle crashes since the prior month's meeting. For the next 40 minutes, committee members squabbled over developing a process for assessing revisions of four different versions of a letter they expect to send to City Council.
By the end of the 90-minute meeting, the committee had hardly discussed revisions and decided to table the letters until August. By the next day, car crashes killed four more people on Portland's streets.
So far this year, vehicle crashes killed 43 people in Portland, putting the city on pace to exceed the 63 official vehicle crash deaths recorded each of the last two years. Eight people died in one week in July, bringing the total to 13 in that month alone.
As PBOT faces deep budget cuts and a $4 billion maintenance backlog, the bureau has repeatedly slashed safety investments, opting instead for road maintenance projects and enforcement mechanisms. Transportation activists say leaders should treat the crisis as a public health emergency and prioritize the safety of people over the unimpeded movement of vehicles.
Charlene McGee, Multnomah County Health Department chronic disease prevention and health promotion unit interim director, said transportation is a public health issue, and data is trending in the wrong direction.
“Transportation is a social determinant of health,” she said. “We know that the built environment in which people live, play, work, worship, impacts their overall health and community health as a whole.”
Unintentional injuries, including traffic crashes, are the third leading cause of death in Multnomah County, and the mortality rate from unintentional injury for Black Multnomah County residents is 1.17 times the rate for white residents. Racial disparities exist in part due to a lack of public infrastructure investment, like sidewalks or lighting, in neighborhoods with higher concentrations of people of color.
Scaling up
Sarah Iannarone, executive director at The Street Trust, a nonprofit advocating for transportation safety and equity, said solutions exist but require material investments from all levels of government. She calls it "scaled problem solving," which begins at the local level and scales up, requiring help from local, state and federal governments to address the crisis from multiple angles.
While anyone using the transit system can utilize those investments, Iannarone said leaders should set the bar for safety by building for vulnerable people such as youth, elders, people with disabilities and homeless Portlanders.
"Unhoused people are already our most vulnerable street users for many reasons," Iannarone said. "When you look at a system through a public health lens, you want to think of that most vulnerable system user and try to solve for their safety because if we're keeping them safe, then everyone's safe."
"Again, if we're designing a system where we commit that every person — whether they're eight or eighty years old — can walk to a few places in the course of their day, the streets will look very different than they look today."
— Sarah Iannarone,
executive director at The Street Trust
In other words, if an ADA curb cut works for a person with a mobility device, logic follows that it will also work for someone carrying groceries, using crutches, or pushing a stroller. According to a 2022 PBOT report, homeless Portlanders were over 50 times more likely to die as pedestrians in traffic crashes than the general population.
Iannarone and other advocates seeking material safety investments face an uphill climb as PBOT grapples with an ongoing budget shortfall. The bureau has a forecasted $60.7 million 5-year deficit, with a projected $32 million in cuts in the 2023-24 fiscal year.
Iannarone said safety projects are often the first to go to meet budget constraints.
"Safety projects are going to be the first ones cut,” she said. “As if that's an accessory and not the central investment aspect of our transportation, maintenance and operations."
City Budget Office analysis of efforts to stabilize PBOT's budget shows $1.475 million in cuts to projects improving sidewalks, crossings, bike safety improvements and slow streets programming, among others. The majority of the cuts — over $1.2 million — are to PBOT's Quick Build Program, which improves safety infrastructure in high crash corridors and near schools. The majority of remaining cuts — $200,000 — are from PBOT's Neighborhood Transportation Safety & Livable Streets Project, charged with building bicycle and pedestrian safety improvements throughout the city.
Commissioner Mingus Mapps became the commissioner overseeing PBOT in 2023 after former Commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty left office. Shannon Carney, Mapps’ senior advisor, said if PBOT is forced to take the full $32 million proposed cut next fiscal year, the bureau may lack funding to match federal grants like the Safe Streets and Roads for All program that would invest in road safety projects.
“That would be a travesty given the unprecedented amount of funding available under the Biden Administration,” Carney said.
Ideas lying around
The Mt. Scott-Arleta Neighborhood Association partnered with PBOT and then-Commissioner Hardesty to address dual concerns about gun violence and traffic safety in 2021. Led by neighbors, the pilot program redesigned Arleta Triangle by creating traffic barriers to slow vehicles and designating a safe space for the community to gather. An independent evaluation found the program successfully reduced both gun violence and speeding in that location.
"It was only possible because we knew that people who lived in a community had the solution for what they have identified as a major problem," Hardesty said.
A pedestrian struck by a person driving 23 mph has a 10% risk of dying, compared with a 25% risk at 32 mph, according to the U.S. Department of Transportation. At 42 mph, the chance of survival is a coin flip. Portland is no different. Speed is a factor in 47% of fatal crashes in Portland, according to PBOT, and the city has been working to reduce speed limits and increase chances of survival in the instance of a crash.
"All the data shows that just slowing down traffic and actually creating a more walkable neighborhood makes communities safer," Hardesty said. "We have not built a transportation system for people. We've built a transportation system for automobiles."
According to the most recent Oregon Department of Transportation, or ODOT, data, 599 people died in vehicle crashes in Oregon in 2021. Oregon experienced a 61% increase in pedestrian fatalities in 2022, according to The Oregonian. That same year, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration estimated 42,795 traffic fatalities in the United States. According to the World Health Organization, an average of 1.35 million people lose their lives in vehicle crashes each year.
Not all roads within city limits are maintained by the city of Portland, creating barriers to achieving the city’s Vision Zero goals, a PBOT program seeking to eliminate traffic fatalities and serious injuries. Lombard Street, Powell Boulevard, and McLoughlin Boulevard are among the local streets managed and maintained by ODOT. Known as "orphan highways," state-owned streets can be transferred to the city of Portland for a price. The state transferred 82nd Avenue to Portland in 2022 in a $185 million, four-year project. Jurisdictional transfer requires cooperation between state and city agencies and the Oregon Legislature.
During the 2023 legislative session, a coalition of three state senators and four legislators sent a request to the Joint Committee on Ways and Means for $15–$30 million to improve safety projects along Powell Boulevard but did not ultimately receive funding.
"Zero dollars," Iannarone said. "For that stretch where people are dying. Our state is not aligning safety spending with the data of where people are dying."
ODOT has been working on several projects to promote safer driving speeds along Powell Boulevard since 2021, including reducing speeds to 30 mph and several school zone projects near Cleveland High School, according to ODOT spokesperson Don Hamilton.
Following the death of local chef Sarah Pliner in 2022, Portland City Council passed an emergency ordinance allowing PBOT to install a 20 mph zone around the high school.
Iannarone said the city could address many issues simply by finishing projects already in the works. Portland completed 29 Rose Lane projects since 2019, with 17 funded and in the design or construction process and 18 more in the planning phase. Rose Lanes are protected lanes marked with red and green paint to prioritize buses and bicycles in congested areas.
Portland passed the 2030 bike plan in 2010 to create a network of bikeways and parking to promote bicycle safety and to address climate change by reducing fossil fuel consumption. The 2016 Vision Zero plan includes goals of reducing and enforcing speed limits.
"Again, if we're designing a system where we commit that every person — whether they're eight or eighty years old — can walk to a few places in the course of their day, the streets will look very different than they look today," Iannarone said.
Enforcement
Mapps feels the most effective immediate intervention is enforcement, penalties and public awareness regarding breaking traffic laws, according to Carney.
“It is also a necessity to expand PPB’s recently reinstated traffic unit as soon as possible,” Carney said. “Finally, it’s critical to raise the community’s awareness of enforcement.”
Since PPB reinstated the traffic division in May 2023, officers have issued over 1,500 citations, according to PPB spokesperson Nathan Sheppard. The division responded to nearly 200 traffic crashes and made over 50 DUI arrests. During that time frame, 23 people died in crashes in Portland.
Carney said PBOT is expanding the speed camera program and expects to install 19 new traffic cameras by the end of this year.
“It is Commissioner Mapps’ hope that over the next few months, Council will rise to the moment and ensure PBOT has the funds to address the hazardous conditions on Portland streets,” Carney said.
Hardesty said equitable enforcement of speed limits and minimizing contact with police officers should remain high priorities. She cites PBOT's authority to issue traffic citations and photo radar systems as enforcement tools that don’t place additional burdens on low-income communities.
"It's not about penalizing people for how they drive," she said. "It's about changing behavior, especially in high crash corridors."
In Multnomah County, Black adults were four times more likely to enter the criminal justice system than white adults, according to a 2021 traffic safety report. The report noted a greater likelihood of being stopped in a vehicle by law enforcement contributes to a higher rate of interaction with the criminal justice system.
“We see the county declare racism as a public health crisis,” McGee said. “We see how racism plays out in different ways and within different systems. And unfortunately, you know, policing is no different.”
At the federal, state and local levels, McGee said the issue can only be resolved through a multi-pronged approach.
“It truly is going to take a collaborative approach to address the public health nature of the traffic fatalities that we're seeing in Multnomah County,” McGee said.
Asked if the most effective approach is to appeal to individuals to slow down, to invest in structural changes that naturally slow vehicles, or if enforcement is a practical approach, Iannarone says each approach plays its role.
"Everything in this space is a ‘yes, and,’” she said. “There's no single antidote to what's ailing us. It's whole systems transformation."
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