Traffic deaths on stretches of Martin Luther King Jr. Way in Seattle have doubled in the last five-year period, despite the city’s goal to reach zero traffic deaths and serious injuries by 2030.
A KUOW analysis of recent city data shows how a city-wide push to lower speed limits can improve some elements of safety – but experts say there is still work to do when it comes to slowing drivers down and keeping pedestrians safe.
it’s a major thoroughfare - basically you have this and I-5 to go north/south; rainier ave is much more narrow with lots of street parking (not that these things stop people speeding through;) I spend a lot of time near MLK/Othello and MLK/Alaska volunteering, I don’t think you can revamp - traffic mitigate, lane reductions etc., - this without it hurting accessibility in a substantial way. it’s already carrying a very heavy amount of traffic.
In my experience people still regularly hit 50 on MLK, I don’t have a problem with the limit set at 25 but any constriction of flow is gonna huuurt.
I mean, I don’t think usage statistics are a great way to evaluate what needs to be done to any given road. If a road has a speed limit as low as 25 mph there probably shouldn’t be more than one lane per direction.
not sure what direction you want to see…? like, yeah, I agree that’s a very low speed limit for a major artery with 2 lanes each way and a two tracks in the middle.
people ignore the speed limit regularly though.
What I mean is, if it has been decided that that road should have a speed limit of 25 mph, it clearly isn’t being thought of as a major thoroughfare. In that case the entire design of the road needs to be such that it discourages people from using it as such, instead directing and encouraging them to use other options better designed for that purpose.
this is the disconnect I struggle with - it needs to be thought of as a major thoroughfare but we’re treating it like superficially decreasing speeds will ‘fix’ it.
mitigating the road to one lane each way would be wretched, it would push even more traffic into people cutting through neighborhoods.
I don’t think there are any ‘right’ answers, just many wrong ones on this issue.