Big changes coming to crosswalks in San Francisco in an effort to prevent pedestrian deaths.
Advocates say the new city plan will make it safer for seniors and people with disabilities to cross the street.
Depending on how wide the street is, the city will give an extra 1-5 seconds. That may not seem significant to some people, but advocates say it can be the difference between someone crossing the street and almost crossing the street and potentially getting hit by a car.
They say this is especially important to seniors and people with disabilities. KRON4 reached out to SFMTA about the new plans. They tell KRON4 it was largely driven by advocacy groups, which have members that are directly affected by this.
They are either elderly, use a cane or wheelchair, or for whatever reason, need a little more time to cross the street. Every year, there are about 20-30 pedestrian deaths in San Francisco.
And advocates say this extra time will hopefully prevent at least some of them.
The city tells KRON4 they will be implementing the new plan at 1,200 intersections. Many of them are in the downtown, Financial District, and South of Market areas.
They tell KRON4 they have already started implementing more time at some intersection such as Geary and Masonic.
KRON4 spoke with a woman who is part of a group called senior and disability action.
She is blind and uses a cane and says the extra time will make a difference.
“Definitely anxiety,” Senior and Disability Action member Alice Chiu said. “I think the idea of, you know, crossing on time is you have to think about where the car is coming and how fast they are going. You can hear the skateboard coming, you know if you are not steady on your foot, it’s scary, it’s definitely scary, and you know, car turning right in front of you and left in front of you, all those are concerns. And so knowing that we will have more time to cross, it’s definitely a comfort.”
The city tells KRON4 most of them will be done in the next two-to-three years.
And the project will be complete in the next 10 years.