… [A]chieving Vision Zero still needs a level of political courage and determination rarely seen in the Bay Area. At rallies, politicians always claim “one life lost is too many,” but then flounder when it’s time to back that up with a serious street intervention or far-reaching regulations. Perhaps the most obscene examples of this were Governor Newsom’s decision to veto Scott Wiener’s speed-governor bill last year, or Supervisor Myrna Melgar’s sabotage of a safety plan in West Portal after a family of four was wiped out by a reckless driver. My fear is that cities will install speed cameras and celebrate the marginal safety improvements, allowing the politicians to declare victory. In reality, speed cameras should be viewed as the least a city can do, not the most.
Architectural solutions only work in places where you ideally don’t want to have any significant amount of traffic in general, because they kill traffic throughput.
If you have an area with high traffic, ideally you want people to drive super consistent 30 or 50km/h.
Speed cameras or section control help with smooth, consistent speed.
Speed bumps and roundabouts cause people to slow down suddenly which kills throughput.
That’s fine in a residential area where you want to get people to instead drive on higher level roads, but it’s really counter-productive on said higher-level roads.