Death on the highway

The heartbreaking case of Raquel Nelson, the 30-year-old low-income mother in suburban Marietta, Georgia, who was prosecuted in July for vehicular homicide after her son died crossing a road, caught the attention of the nation. Nelson, who doesn’t even own a car, had just gotten off the bus with her three kids following a birthday shopping trip to Walmart for son A.J., who was to turn 5 the next day. A.J. never made it home to an apartment complex on the other side of the highway from the bus stop.

The hit-and-run driver, who admitted drinking and taking painkillers, spent six months in prison. Nelson was sentenced to 12 months’ probation but appealed the conviction and has been offered a new trial.

The prosecution never implicated the public officials who failed to place a crosswalk connecting the bus stop to the complex. Residents were expected, against evidence of human nature, to walk three-tenths of a mile along the highway, cross five lanes of traffic at the light, and walk the same distance back — with groceries, children, or whatever else they were bringing home.

The issue in this case goes far beyond the placement of crosswalks and the actions of a misguided district attorney. In Raquel Nelson’s neighborhood, everybody is expected to drive. If you don’t have the money to own and maintain a car, or if you can’t or would rather not drive for any other reason, the inference is that you had just better live somewhere else.

Marietta is a 57,000-person suburb, fully built out according to suburban planning and land-use regulations. There are a number of indications that Raquel Nelson’s neighborhood is not set up for anybody to get around without a car.

• The Walk Score (Street Smart version) for that location is 23 out of 100 points, the lowest range in Walk Score’s system for measuring the ability to reach everyday needs on foot. The nearest park is 1.4 miles away. The closest grocery store is 0.6 miles — but you have to follow a road where nobody would choose to walk.

• The average block size is 26 acres, whereas compact, walkable neighborhoods tend to have block sizes of 5 acres or less.

• The average family in that locale spends 20 percent or more of its income on automobile transportation, according to the Housing & Transportation Affordability Index.

• The average family there generates 7.9 metric tons of carbon dioxide per year through driving — more than double the figure in downtown Atlanta neighborhoods.

• Bus service where Nelson lives, as in most suburban neighborhoods, is infrequent and poor — letting people off in locations that are dangerous or unpleasant to walk.

Thousands saved and millions improved

As David Goldberg, communications director for Transportation for America, wrote in an op-ed for The Washington Post, “Neither the public transportation system nor the highway designs work for those who live, work and walk in these areas. People are being punished and killed simply for being pedestrians. Our research shows that thousands of lives could be saved — and millions more lives improved — by retrofitting these dangerous roads, as many communities are trying to do.”

If there is any bright side to this situation, it is that America is starting to recognize what’s wrong with the environment we’ve engineered. In the past several years, many governments, including the State of New York this summer in response to a child’s death on Long Island (see our article "Governor Andrew Cuomo signs New York Complete Streets legislation"), have adopted Complete Streets policies — a clear acknowledgement that streets and roads need to work for everyone.

Reports such as the recent Dangerous by Design, from Smart Growth America and Taxpayers for Common Sense, are putting pressure on states and municipalities to make the pedestrian realm safer. Meanwhile, advances in the Walk Score system — and growing acceptance of Walk Score by planners and the public (see our recent article "Walk Score could lead to better-planned transit networks") — should intensify the pressure.

It will take time to overcome the safety deficit that has accumulated over decades, but governments need to act with urgency. What happened in Marietta reveals how exposed millions of Americans are to mortal danger in their daily lives.