With local government agencies slow and often non-responsive, citizens are taking initiatives into their own hands to make streets safer
The goal of Crosswalk Collective LA is very simple. “We just think it would be nice if children got the chance to live to adulthood.”
How do they want to advance that goal? It’s pretty simple: safety installations throughout Los Angeles. Primarily, as their name would suggest, with crosswalks that enable pedestrians to walk through their neighborhood without risking their lives.
Traffic and road safety accounts for more than 40,000 deaths in the United States, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. On housing activist and self-professed transit know-it-all Darrell Owens’ substack I’m Not Going To Wait Anymore, he notes that “if we’re going to get traffic safety, we must fight for it. I’m not going to negotiate my safety or the safety of loved ones with the chamber of commerce, the city council or motorists who think they have a right to drive over every inch of pavement that exists…There’s a long history of neighbors taking matters into their own hands. We need to bring tactical urbanism back.”
CCLA is one of a number of groups throughout the United States, and the world, that is doing just that. Tactical urbanism, as defined by the Tactical Urbanist’s Guide, “refers to a city, organizational, and/or citizen-led approach to neighborhood building using short-term, low-cost, and scalable interventions to catalyze long-term change.”
Read the full article on Inside Hook
Author: Trish Rooney
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