1. We called on the City to quickly install 80-100 miles of infrastructure for light individual transportation (LIT: includes scooters and bikes) from pre-existing plans already vetted through community engagement, such as the Quick-Build projects of 2017, the Action Plan for Safer Streets, Cycle Atlanta 1.0 & 2.0, Renew Atlanta, TSPLOST, etc. We said this would mean ensuring that the new Atlanta Department of Transportation (ATL DOT) has sufficient funding through the FY2021 budget to do this work in-house using City of Atlanta staff, not expensive contractors, using methods and materials that are fast and cost-effective. 

• Accelerate timeline of Mayor’s Action Plan for Safer Streets: the official announcement from 2019 stated projects would be complete by the end of 2021, yet the ATL DOT budget narrative says three years from now--2023.
• Fund 80-100 miles of LIT lanes and sidewalk repairs to meet the needs of essential workers and trips and provide a timeline. 
  Address where the 3.5% of the General Fund set aside for infrastructure maintenance per ordinance 14-O-1513 appears. Designate those funds for safe space for walking & wheelchair use. 
• Designate Tuskegee Airmen Academy (TAG) as the City’s pilot Safe Routes to School program and allocate $450,000 for safety improvements to facilitate safe walking and biking to school
• Spend the remaining Council District Renew Atlanta funds on tactical sidewalks. 

Results so far: Several projects from the Action Plan for Safer Streets are in final design stages. The new Atlanta Department of Transportation draft budget is listed as $44 million (650-page City of Atlanta draft budget is here). We believe the initial budget outlay was increased to $48 Million but are still waiting on the final budget book. For comparison, the Office of Transportation formerly housed in the Public Works Dept. had an FY2018 budget of $46 million according to the ATL DOT Feasibility Study. That office is just one of three units being combined into the ATL DOT, the others being the Office of Mobility Planning and Renew Atlanta/TSPLOST. 

2. We called on the City to provide urgently-needed safe spaces for people walking or using wheelchairs, starting with any gaps in the sidewalk network along remaining MARTA bus routes and on streets accessing those bus routes, and Safe Routes to School so children can walk and bike safely when schools do reopen. Since it can take years to get sidewalks built, consider "tactical sidewalks" using less expensive materials to provide some protection now.

Results so far: Mayor Bottoms directed the Chief Operating Officer to work with the Atlanta Department of Transportation to "develop a plan for Atlanta’s streets. This plan recognizes the role of the City in the economic recovery of local businesses and the ability to use public space to support quality of life during the reopening." The plan was to include creating “tactical sidewalks” to improve mobility in communities to essential services. In addition, sidewalk improvements seem to be gaining prominence within the new ATL DOT, which often posts about sidewalk projects on #SidewalkWednesdays. 

3. We called on the City to empower communities to creatively improve safety on their streets through their own interim projects by establishing a city approval process, or tactical urbanism permit. Additionally, create a small grants fund so under-resourced neighborhoods have equitable access to the process.

Results so far: The City has a tactical urbanism permit in draft stage; expected by October 2020

Challenges

There are communities in the city of Atlanta with almost no sidewalks at all. Often, these are the same neighborhoods that have been most harmed by transportation projects such as highways splitting their neighborhoods in half. This is partly due to redlining policies that imposed structural racism on neighborhood development. Communities with lower sidewalk coverage also have higher rates of walking and riding transit, are disproportionately located within the High Injury Network, and have a larger share of Black residents. These neighborhoods are also home to many people with essential jobs who rely on transit. 

Picture it: you rely on transit, the bus route that is three blocks from your house is cut, you are now walking further to catch the bus, maybe carrying groceries or with your young child or both.. As you are walking, the sidewalk suddenly ends. You are now in the street, sharing the road with vehicles that were not anticipating you being there. Your essential trip to the grocery store or work has become more dangerous than fellow Atlantans who can count on sidewalks to reach their destinations. 

Safe Streets for All means all types of safety for all types of users in all of Atlanta. The built environment can reinforce a sense of belonging and provide a way to protect vulnerable road users. Yes, protect those who walk, bike, or use a wheelchair. But also protect Black and Brown people, women, and transgender residents that face varying safety concerns while walking and biking that are not a reality for others. Having neighborhood sidewalks as an Atlanta resident should not be among their concerns. Let’s build sidewalks that will create neighborhoods that can sustain growth, development, aging in place, and the inclusion of many different types of users.  

As we have said before, the time is overdue to prioritize safety and ease of movement for our community members who have been denied safe and complete streets for decades. 

Partners

AARP Georgia, Helping Georgians aged 50 and above live their best lives.

American Heart Association of Metro Atlanta, a relentless force for longer, healthier lives in our community.

PEDS, dedicated to making streets and communities in Georgia, safe, inviting, and accessible to all pedestrians. 

Georgia STAND-UP, a Think and ACT Tank for Working Communities, organizes and educates communities about issues related to labor unions, transit equity, affordable housing, & economic development.

TransFormation Alliance, a broad partnership of organizations from the private, public and nonprofit sectors dedicated to creating thriving, mixed-income communities anchored by transit and linked to all the opportunities and amenities that make Atlanta great. 

ThreadATL, a non-profit that aims to influence Atlanta’s planning and design decisions toward a greater focus on good urbanism

How to stay involved

Sign up for updates so we can call on you to support the campaign’s next steps--because this is just the beginning!

The City has an opportunity to show its commitment to #VisionZero by accelerating safety projects, so no one dies trying to get somewhere. Help us hold the City of Atlanta accountable for following through on its plans. #EssentialTransportation

"I can make a coffee table book of all the crashes I've seen from my front porch," said Kim Wilson, a resident who lives on Monroe Drive. Her child is starting at Grady High School in the fall and she's terrified of letting them walk to school on a street where car speeds exceed 50 mph. "What's it going to take to address safety? Is it going to take another student dying?"

People who walk or bike on Monroe Drive between Piedmont Avenue and 10th Street must compete with speeding cars and dangerous intersections on a daily basis. These conditions are unacceptable. Voters overwhelmingly approved the Renew Atlanta Bond in 2015 because Complete Street projects like the one on Monroe Drive/Boulevard promised to make our streets safer for everyone. The latest Renew Atlanta plans for Monroe Drive north of 10th Street preserve the same old design that virtually ensures that Monroe Drive remains a highway that endangers everyone from people like Wilson's child to rush hour car commuters. Check out the video below for reactions from residents on Monroe Drive north of Ponce de Leon, then join us as we demand the road diet be added to the Monroe Drive/Boulevard Complete Street Project. 

The goal of this state road project is to make Moreland Avenue safer for people on foot and on bike, between Mansfield and Austin Aves. (Several years ago, a person riding a bike was killed in this section as they pulled out onto Moreland.)

The state DOT's concept report states "studies show that an increase in pedestrian, cycling and vehicular volumes has taken place along the corridor. Crash data from 2008-2013 indicates that approximately 252 crashes occurred along SR 42/Moreland Ave from Dekalb Ave to McClendon Ave. Of these crashes, six were pedestrian injuries and one was a bike fatality." 

Neighborhood bike advocates and the City of Atlanta Planning Office have been involved in the design, and did not settle for painted bike lanes. Instead, the current design includes a raised bike lane, as well as wider sidewalks and safe crossings. While barrier-separated, protected bike lanes on busy roads are always the safest option, they may not be possible on Moreland because NACTO guidelines recommend a minimum of 3' to add a raised barrier.

Here’s what was presented at the public meeting June 7, 2017:

• Bike lanes raised 3” above the street level and 3” below the sidewalk level.

• Bike lanes would be 7’ wide - including a 2’ painted buffer.

• Timeline - During Summer 2017, they will stripe standard bike lanes for a quick safety improvement and reduce lane widths on general lanes to reduce speeds. In 2019, bicycle lanes upgraded to raised.

Here's what we told GDOT - feel free to include this in your comment supporting the project:

1. We support high quality, raised bike lanes and pedestrian crossings for SR 42/Moreland Avenue from Dekalb Avenue to Mansfield Avenue. 

2. To make the project even better, find a way to add a barrier between the raised bike lane and the general travel lane, so that people on bikes are separated from all those trucks. While the idea of separating people on foot from those on bikes is a good one, it's all relative. Trucks have the potential to do more damage to a person biking in a crash, so we think it's more important to separate those two modes from each other.

3. Add a crossing near the DeKalb Avenue interchange, and make the exit ramp from DeKalb form a "T" intersection, to encourage drivers entering Moreland to make a full stop first.

4. We like the diagonal crossing at Euclid as a way to make that crossing safer and easier for people on bikes, and it helps make up for the lack of bike lanes north of Euclid. 

Read GDOT's Response to Public Comment Here: GDOT's Response to 6/7/17 Open House Comments

Click here for more background on our campaign for a safe and complete DeKalb Ave. 

These are the core policies and goals we believe the next Mayor and City Council must adopt if Atlanta wants to continue to compete for the best talent in the world while improving the quality of life for Atlantans who have been historically disadvantaged and marginalized by a lack of transportation options. 

• Create a City of Atlanta Department of Transportation, for a cohesive transportation planning and project delivery process that better leverages resources

• Adopt the Street Design Policy drafted by the Department of Planning

• Make housing more affordable by eliminating the minimum number of car parking spaces required for housing developments

• Build 100 NEW miles of high-quality bike lanes and trails (we currently have 104 miles) to connect the city,  including 20 NEW miles of protected bike lanes (we currently have 4 miles)

• Publish schedule for sweeping streets with bike lanes, and prioritize bike lanes for clean up after winter storms

• Add a $2.5 million line item to the City’s General Fund annually, to connect gaps in the bikeway network and enhance safety of existing projects

• Ensure quality bicycle transportation by hiring transportation engineers with training and experience designing bicycle projects

• Set a city goal of zero traffic deaths, and create a data-driven approach in which multiple city departments collaborate to reduce roadway crashes and fatalities to zero, because no one should die trying to get where they are going.

• Prevent fatal roadway crashes by standardizing the speed limit on residential streets to 25 mph

• Provide access to last-mile healthy transportation options by prioritizing installation of bike share stations in low-income, disinvested, and disconnected neighborhoods

Questions about our platform or our engagement events? Please contact Bennett Foster at [email protected] or call 404-881-1112 x 2.

Ralph David Abernathy Boulevard, affectionately known as RDA, serves as a major corridor for schools, historic neighborhoods, and businesses in Southwest Atlanta. RDA is a large street with fast traffic and a lonely stretch of bike lane between Murphy Ave and I-85. The road, whether by bike or by car, is often perilous due to potholes, debris, and jagged train tracks.

RDA turns into Georgia Avenue and runs through seven amazing Atlanta neighborhoods: Westview, West End, Adair Park, Pittsburgh, Mechanicsville, Summerhill, and Grant Park.

The Atlanta Bicycle Coalition connects these neighborhoods at Atlanta Streets Alive. You can help make this a more livable, walkable, and bikeable corridor all year-round by supporting our campaign for bike lanes and regular maintenance on RDA and Georgia Avenue.

In addition to bike lanes on RDA and Georgia Avenue, we are advocating for:

• Resurfacing and repairing dangerous potholes on RDA
• Regularly maintaining this critical corridor by sweeping trash and debris
• Paving over the hazardous out-of-use train tracks