A road in Lower Manhattan has an unfortunate new honor: It was the deadliest street for pedestrians in New York City and the third most dangerous in the entire country between 2001 and 2016, according to a study.
The report, published earlier this year in the Journal of Transport and Land Use, identified dozens of “hot spots” across the country, where at least six pedestrians lost their lives between 2001 and 2016, when the most recent federal data was available. .
Among the worst places, the third worst to be exact, is Canal Street between West Broadway and the Bowery, where 15 people died during the span of 18 years.
The stretch borders SoHo to the west and enters Chinatown to the east, from where Elizabeth Street intersects Canal Street to where Canal Street intersects Broadway.
The sheer number of deaths is likely not much of a surprise to Lower Manhattanites living near the area. The Canal Street stretch has had 129 total crashes since 2011, which is the first year the NYC Crash Mapper began recording the data.
Only two stretches of highway in Florida had a higher number of deaths than occurred between 2001 and 2016, according to the study.
The Canal Street stretch of highways has four lanes, a 25 mph speed limit, and a bus route.
There were 10 other Manhattan corridors to make the list of deadliest streets, the study shows.
The study on the deaths was conducted by researchers from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Arizona State University and the planning company Toole Design Group. And it was first reported by Streetsblog, which described the project as “the only attempt to map the nation’s corridors with the highest number of pedestrian fatalities ever made.”
The authors found that pedestrian fatalities are “at their highest level in nearly three decades” and account for a growing proportion of total traffic fatalities.
“To achieve the vision of a future transportation system that produces zero fatalities, pedestrian safety must be improved,” they wrote.
Almost all of the “danger spots” identified in the study are multi-lane highways, most of which force pedestrians to cross at least five lanes of traffic. Most of the neighboring neighborhoods are low-income.
Here you can see the full report.
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