Day 4

Today is a day of learning more about Vision Zero with listening to presentations and
going on tours. The first presentation was given by Transportation Alternatives, which is an
organization that focuses on reinforcing the progress of Vision Zero in New York. We learned
that building connections with different departments and organizations is crucial for the
productivity and effectiveness for implementing projects. I think this is something that SF Vision
Zero should learn more about because our progress may need to rely on these relationships in
some ways. Furthermore, the most impressive part of their presentation was about all the events
that they created for people’s engagement and support for their campaigns. I believe if San Francisco can be innovative about their ways of reaching out to people, it would be easier to
gather strength to make changes.

After that, we met with DOT and they showed us statistical data in different perspectives
for showing the progress that Vision Zero made in the past three years. We discussed about the
effects of creating lanes for cyclists, that it can encourage riding bicycles and ensure the safety of
cyclist, which is both environmental friendly and benefit of the traffic. It was great to see that the
city made a new bike lane near my high school(Galileo), this is helpful to cyclists to have a
better experience of riding bikes to school. Then, we also learned about various projects that
DOT implemented in Manhattan Chinatown, including the new pedestrian areas they expanded,
speed humps and etc. For example, one of the presenter talked about how they implement
infrastructure with the idea of what the users would normally do in mind, so when the
infrastructure is implemented, the users would not ignore or misuse such infrastructure.  Another
thing I learned about Vision Zero is that a goal of this plan is to make the street more forgiving
for all of the road users, so when someone actually make a mistake, it won’t result in death.
Moreover, I think collecting data and having explicit observations can help make a better
decision on changing the roads for pedestrian safety, and I am looking forward to see some new
changes that Vision Zero make in San Francisco.
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-Hugo Chen, Kelly Ma