Road safety for pedestrians and cyclists

0:00You're listening to Life Kit from NPR. Hey, it's Marielle. Our office in New York overlooks a busy city park and several side streets, and when I look down on it from our big glass windows, I see cars going by, vroom vroom, trucks parked, delivery bikes weaving in and out of traffic, people crossing at the crosswalk, people crossing not at the crosswalk, taxis turning into the crosswalk, buses plowing through the bus lane, oh, and a guy in a scooter zipping by. It reminds me of the opening credits from the 90s TV show The Busy World of Richard Scarry, where this cute little worm wearing a fedora descends into Busytown in his apple-shaped helicopter-slash-car.

0:45Hey, it's time to love and play. So have a happy day. Come visit Busytown. Lots of things to do and see. It's so much fun to be. A part of Busytown. There is indeed lots to see, including what looks like a six-way intersection with a hard-working police dog at the center directing traffic and preventing collisions. Busytown has some more whimsical modes of transport than New York City. There's also a car in the shape of a hot dog. But the point I think they were making here, what they were trying to teach to kids, is lost on us adults sometimes. We've got to coexist in these streets. And that is not always easy.

1:29According to the latest complete set of data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, in 2023, about 7 ,000 pedestrians were struck and killed in traffic crashes in the U.S. and about 68 ,000 were injured. Also, more than 1 ,000 cyclists were killed. NPR health correspondent Ping Huang has been reporting on this data. And on this episode of Life Kit, she's going to talk to us about what we can do in all of our roles on these busy streets to keep each other safe.

2:02All right, Pink, let's start here. What can people do when they're biking or walking to be safer? So I spoke with a guy named Ryan Sharp. He's a transportation consultant with a firm called Alta Planning and Design. And one of the tips I heard from Ryan was an upgrade of something that I heard when I was a kid. So there's the tip of looking both ways before you cross the road. Ryan says that's been updated. Oftentimes the greatest hazards if you're a pedestrian trying to cross at an intersection are actually coming from behind you. So when I teach my kids to cross the street now, I always tell them to look in all directions.

2:38And this is especially important in situations where you might be crossing the road and a car is coming up behind you trying to turn into the area that you're walking in. And, you know, the driver might be focused on shooting a gap between cars or looking at oncoming traffic. They might not actually see you in the crosswalk. So looking right, looking left, looking over your shoulder at what's behind you, that can really help you see what's coming before you cross the street. That also goes for bikes going through intersections. So checking over your shoulder for cars that might be trying to turn.

3:10Even if you have right of way, they might not be able to see you. And, you know, if you're a biker or pedestrian getting hit by a car, you're going to be the more injured one. Yeah, it's tricky when you're biking, especially if you're not that confident on your bike to turn around when you're riding because you also don't want to turn and then miss something that's in front of you. Yeah, it is really hard. I mean, I bike a lot. And I think one of the things that I've sort of been focused on in doing this reporting is how important it is to stay not distracted. You know, like, I'm guilty of listening to podcasts sometimes when I bike, you know, or having my headphones in.

3:47And I think now that I'm focused on being aware, I think listening for the sound of a car coming behind you, like you can get a lot of cues from visual, but also from like the audio of what's happening around you too. Yeah, for sure. It does sound a lot like the advice we give to drivers to check their blind spot before they switch lanes. Yeah. And in fact, there are a lot of like corollaries with driving. So Ryan said that, you know, people talk about defensive driving a lot, but he actually thinks that defensive walking and defensive biking is more of a thing that should be practiced here. And, you know, I was like, Ryan, what do you mean by that?

4:22And he said, well, it means being visible and predictable, paying attention to your surroundings and, you know, just sort of having a constant awareness of what the environment is and being able to anticipate what are potential hazards around you and how you can actually move to avoid them before they happen. What does he mean by visible and predictable? Yeah. So one of the things that I found interesting in the reporting was the most common scenarios for when people actually get struck and killed by cars. And more than three quarters of deaths for pedestrians actually happen after dark, and most of them happen in places without sidewalks.

4:58So in terms of being visible and predictable, I think for walkers, that means like being on the sidewalk or being on a walking path instead of being in the street if you can. Or if you have to walk in the street, you know, walking on the shoulder of the street against traffic so that you can see oncoming cars and they can see you. It's different for bikes because they go faster. So bikes should be going with traffic, but making sure that they have lights if they're out at night, white lights in the front, red lights in the back, just like a car. Bikers should always be wearing helmets because that protects your head.

5:29I'm curious, did you learn anything about how a helmet should fit? Because sometimes I feel like my bike helmet isn't actually the right fit. Like it's sliding too much. Right. The way to sort of ensure the right fit for a helmet is to, you know, put it on your head, make sure that it's covering your forehead, not tipping backwards or forwards very much. You want to sort of have it positioned maybe one or two finger widths above your eyebrow. And then the side strap should be forming a V-shape under and slightly in front of your ears on either side of your face. And then you want to buckle and tighten the chin strap until it's super snug.

6:07So no more than one or two fingers should be able to fit between your chin and the strap once it's buckled. And when it's on your head and fully fitted, the helmet shouldn't be rocking more than one inch side to side or front to back on your head. Okay. You know, the CDC recommends also wearing visible clothing or accessories with like the reflective strips that make you more visible and predictable. It feels kind of like, of course, drivers should be responsible for what they do and know that they are operating a potentially deadly weapon. But also, as a biker or a walker, there are things that you're going to want to do to keep yourself safe, knowing that other people do make mistakes.

6:49Exactly. And so all that said, for bikers specifically, what are some other ways to be predictable and communicate with the cars and the pedestrians around you? Yeah. And I would also add the other bikers behind you as well. So one of those things that would be really good to use a lot is hand signals. So if you're biking and you're going straight and you want to turn left, you want to stick your arm straight out to the left to indicate that you're turning left. and if you're taking a right, there's two ways to do that. So the first one is if you've got your arm sticking straight out for left, you want to sort of raise your left arm up in an L shape so you can kind of point over your head as though you're pointing to the right or you can also, alternatively, you can just use your right arm and just sort of stick it straight out to indicate that you're going right as well.

7:35Yeah, that's the one I usually go with because I feel like drivers don't necessarily know the other one. So it's just, okay, my right arm's out, I'm going to the right. My left arm's out. I'm going left. It's pretty clear. We'll have more tips from Ping after a quick break. All right. We've talked about how pedestrians and cyclists can keep themselves and other people safer. What about drivers? What can they do to make a crash less likely? I mean, obviously be alert, right? And don't text and drive. Well, for one thing, don't drink and drive or be on drugs and drive. That can really impair your judgment and your ability to respond quickly.

8:15And then another thing that people can do is it's called the Dutch reach and it's for drivers as well as passengers in the car. And this is really a technique that just avoids like opening your door blindly into the path of a biker or even a walker who's just walking next to you. So in order to do this, you want to be sitting in your car and you actually want to not open the door with the hand closest to you, but actually pivot your body and then look behind you, make sure that no one's coming before you use the other arm to open the door. And so it's a fancy way of just saying, turn and look behind you before you open your door to make sure that you're not going to hit a biker or a walker that's coming towards you.

8:57That's really smart. I do want to note here that we can all do our very best to stay safe, especially as pedestrians and cyclists and still get hurt. That's a point that Julia Kite-Laidlaw, who's a pedestrian and cyclist safety advocate with the National Safety Council wanted to make very clear. Those kind of crashes can really make people walking and biking sometimes feel helpless. Like they're following all the laws. They're doing what they're supposed to. And people are still getting killed. But it's not true that there's nothing they can do. There's advocacy. And Julia works for this thing called the Road to Zero Coalition, which takes a systems approach to road design.

9:34Things like reducing speed limits or putting up speed cameras, narrowing roadways. All of that serves to slow drivers down a little bit. And, you know, these changes don't absolve anyone of behaving poorly, but they do aim to reduce the chance that, like, when someone makes a mistake, collisions are less likely. And then if the collision does happen, it's less catastrophic when it does actually happen. Yeah. And when she talks about advocacy, does she mean that we can be advocating for safer streets in our own communities? Yeah, exactly. There are communities around the country that have done this to great effect.

10:08You know, Ryan Sharp, who we mentioned earlier, he was actually in charge of the Department of Transportation in Hoboken, New Jersey, for many years. And he presided over a plan that resulted in, I think, seven going on eight years now of zero traffic deaths in Hoboken, which is a small city. So, you know, communities, when they do rally behind these types of changes to their road design and sort of changing the culture around how people interact on the street, it can be really effective. What kinds of changes have you seen here in D.C.? So, these days in a lot of DC intersections, when you hit a four-way intersection and there's a red light, the light for pedestrians will turn first and give pedestrians a lead of a couple seconds before the light for the cars turns green.

10:58And that is really effective in making sure that cars can see pedestrians and be clear that they have the right of way. I've also seen curb build-outs, which shorten the length of a crosswalk. And if you pull the curb out on either side of a crosswalk, the amount of time a person is actually just exposed in the middle of the street is much less. Yeah. I wonder, have you ever had the experience where you're driving and you're like, oh my God, these bikers are going so slow or they're being so reckless. Or there's somebody walking across the street, but they're on their phone, their head is buried in their phone.

11:32But then the next day you're biking and you're like, this guy's in such a rush. Like this car, like where are you going, buddy? Or, you know, the car's in the bike lane and you're like, you're in the bike lane. Yeah. This is like literally every day for me. Yeah. It happens all the time. I mean, even this morning I was biking on a sidewalk and I was getting annoyed that the people around me were walking very slowly. Yeah. I think you might have been in the wrong there. Guilty. Yeah. Yeah. But I mean, this is also just, you know, part of the way that our roadways are designed right now. You know, they're kind of imperfect.

12:07Like I was on a sidewalk because I was biking in the bike lane, but the bike lane doesn't connect. And that's kind of a problem in a lot of places. You know, like a lot of cities are currently increasing the infrastructure they have for cars and bikes and people. But, you know, it's not perfect at the moment. I think the general point here is we need to try to have empathy for other people and to try to see things from their perspectives. And that might be revealed to you when one day you're the driver and the next day you're the biker and the next day you're the walker because you really can see all sides of it.

12:44Yeah, exactly. And I mean, one of the things that was enforced to me over and over from everyone I spoke with for reporting the story was that like everyone uses multiple modes of transportation. You know, a lot of people bike, walk, use public transportation, drive. You can be all of these things in a not very long time span. And so it's sort of being able to perspective take, which is actually a superpower when you're walking or biking on the road, because you can actually imagine how other people would act and, you know, put yourself in their shoes and anticipate better what might happen. Ping, thank you so much.

13:20You're welcome. Thanks for having me. That was NPR health correspondent Ping Huang. All right, time for a recap. Takeaway one, if you're walking or biking, don't just look both ways when you're moving through the street. Look behind you, too. Often people get hit by cars that are coming from behind them or turning into the crosswalk they're in. Stay alert when you're biking or crossing the street, using all the senses you have available. Don't listen to music or podcasts while you're biking around. And turn the audio off when you're crossing the street so you can hear the sounds of traffic. Also, do not look at your phone while you're biking or crossing the road.

13:59Please, eyes up. Takeaway two, stay visible and predictable. Make it easy for drivers to see you. If you can, walk on the sidewalk. If you have to walk in the street, walk on the shoulder against traffic. Bikes should have white lights in the front and red ones in the back like a car. As a biker or walker out at night on a high traffic or dark road, consider wearing reflective clothing. Takeaway three, bikers always wear a helmet. The helmet should cover your forehead, landing one or two finger widths above your eyebrows. The side strap should form a V-shape under and slightly in front of your ears.

14:38Buckle the chin strap until it's snug. The helmet should not be able to rock more than one inch side to side or front to back once you have it on. Also, use hand signals when you're turning. The easiest ones to remember are left arm straight out for a left turn and right arm straight out for a right turn. Takeaway four. Drivers, do not drink and drive. Do not do drugs and drive. Don't text while you're driving or fiddle with the music on your phone. Also, always use your turn signals. And if you're parked and about to get out on the driver's side, try something called the Dutch Reach. Don't open the door with the hand closest to you.

15:16Instead, pivot your body, look behind you, and make sure no one is coming before you use the other arm to open the door. Takeaway five is to consider advocating for safer streets policies in your neighborhood. And have empathy for the other folks who are out there on the road, even when they're annoying you, even when it's hard. Remember, they're trying to get somewhere just like you. Okay, that's our show. If you love Life Kit and you want even more, follow us on Instagram at NPR Life Kit. There's a great video on there right now about how to accept a compliment, plus a comic about the do's and don'ts of bathing.

15:53You can find those again by following us at NPR Life Kit. This episode of Life Kit was produced by Sylvie Douglas. Our visuals editor is Beck Harlan, and our digital editor is Malika Grebe. Megan Cain is our senior supervising editor, and Beth Donovan is our executive producer. Our production team also includes Claire Marie Schneider, Andy Tegel, and Margaret Serino. Fact-checking by Tyler Jones. Engineering support comes from David Greenberg. I'm Mariel Segarra. Thanks for listening.