Montgomery’s top elected official wants to spend nearly $5 million on pedestrian safety after the fourth such fatality in the county in the past two weeks.
County Executive Ike Leggett made the proposal Wednesday, saying that despite a $401 million projected budget gap in the coming fiscal year, the money is necessary to fight a climbing death toll.
The county had an average of 430 crashes involving pedestrians and 14 pedestrian fatalities a year from 2003 to 2006.
So far this year, there have been 16 pedestrian deaths, according to police.
“This is too much, it’s unacceptable and we have to change,” Leggett said. “We have a tight budget crunch at this time, but I promise we will have the resources to move this initiative forward. It is too important for us not to do it.”
The measure would increase spending on pedestrian safety initiatives about $4.8 million per year, or $28.8 million over six years. The county currently spends about $30 million a year in pedestrian-related programs.
Leggett’s plan calls for upgrading pedestrian signals, enhancing street lighting and sidewalks, increasing the emphasis on pedestrians and bicyclists in the planning process, educational outreach to improve driver and pedestrian behavior, and implementing corridor and intersection improvements.
“Very often it is pedestrians that are walking out in front of traffic. It’s dark, they’re wearing dark clothing and drivers don’t see them,” Police Chief J. Thomas Manger said. “Or, it’s drivers that are just not paying attention. They’re not anticipating somebody might be crossing the street or might be stepping out in front of them.”
Lora Rakowski, spokeswoman for the Maryland State Highway Administration, said about 100 pedestrians were killed on Maryland roadways last year, but that any number of pedestrian fatalities should not be viewed as inevitable.
“The philosophy that these are just accidents or random occurrences we take issue with,” Rakowski said. “We call them crashes because they are predictable and in many cases preventable. The only acceptable number of pedestrian fatalities really is zero.”
