New York City can be dangerous, but most people do not correctly assess what the true dangers are. Murders, muggings, rapes and assaults can be random but just as often those crimes are the result of arguments and existing tensions between people, in other words, if you have a peaceful life and no criminal friends you are not that likely to have crime randomly wander into your life. This is true even if you live in a high crime area. Traffic deaths and injuries, on the other hand, are quite random. We are all at risk whenever we leave our apartments and co-ops. Not even the sidewalk is safe since pedestrians and even children have lost their lives while walking on the sidewalk.
This is why I do not understand why the first kind of crime inspires so much fear while the second is hardly important enough to get decent news coverage or even laws to hold the perpetrators accountable for their actions. It is something of a myth that there are people hiding in the bushes of Central Park (or even the bushes of Pelham Bay Park) waiting to murder you in NYC. Yes. there are arguments between people that get ugly, domestic violence, there are date rapists and con-men as in any city… and this is all very serious. But random street violence that targets the innocent passerby? It's a myth… A fantasy from a movie version of NYC. That is UNLESS you count what cars do. Cars do jump out from behind the bushes and murder people. Cars do injure or kill the innocent passerby.
That ought to scare people deeply, if you ask me.
Obviously, the malicious intent of hardened criminals makes them more frightening than inept, inattentive or road raging drivers but, at this point, in NYC, the number of people killed by murderers is at parity with the number killed by cars. Despite this, far more police time is spent on the "murder problem" than on the tragic loss of life that happens every singe day on our streets. More to the point no police time is spent to address this issue and there are few if any laws directed at stopping it. In recent years we have had some "traffic calming" installed mostly in the more well-to-do neighborhoods in the city, and this has made the streets much more pleasant and safe in those areas, but for the majority of New Yorkers there is still a very long way to go. We need new laws that hold motorists accountable-- and we need to extend street and sidewalk improvements to encompass greater areas of the city. The DOT has worked hard to make this happen against varied and often irrational political opposition. It has never been clear to me if Mayor Bloomberg likes traffic calming because he cares about human lives or about property vales but I'll take either. I do not know if the new Mayor Bill de Blasio will continue the fight or not. As a Bronx resident the view from where I am of city hall is criss-crossed with many dangerous streets and bridges. We need so much and we have received so little and I am tired of being told that the distribution of improvements is equitable when anyone can look at it and see that it clearly is not. If this was just cosmetic I could let it go, but while jogging the other day a car almost clipped me on the Macombs Dam Bridge and this was the second time the first time I was not so lucky and I watched my dream of running the NYC marathon almost vanish*. Other people have lost things far more significant than marathon dreams.
We do not need to just accept these deaths and these injuries as the price of progress. We can have a city where this is not something that happens all of the time. We deserve such a city.
"While outgoing Mayor Mike Bloomberg has managed to cut down on the number of murders in the city, traffic accidents are a different story. Through September 1, 189 people had been killed by traffic accidents in the city, slightly down from last year’s numbers, but during a one-week period in early October, six people—including three children—were killed in traffic accidents. No one was murdered that week."
A good article about how police map crime stats by neighborhood for things like murder and rape but not traffic crime. Think of how this stigmatizes neighborhoods.
Think also of how a traffic crime map might look and what it would say.
http://motherboard.vice.com/...
*What follows are photos telling my story of injury and recovery. I want to give a sense of how deeply even a small injury can impact the life of a person. This is the impact of an injury. Think about the impact of a death.
After running a PR in the 5th avenue mile. Having done all 5 of the half-marathons in NYC I was ready to do the ING NYC marathon next fall. I felt invincible! Little did I know that this was one of the last races I would run for years.
After my foot was crushed I was on crutches for months. Then unable to run long distances for almost two years. The driver was on a cell phone. I guess I got off easy, looking back. But, I was very angry.
I was able to bike before I could run long distance without with fractures acting up.
This summer I biked across Iowa (about 400 miles) with my husband and father-in-law. My father in-law is an amazing dude when it comes to biking, you might even call him a "beast.") I had gained a bit of weight and almost given up on things like running but this was my turning point. It took my foot 3 years to heal … but my heart took a lot longer.
A few days ago at the Yancy Track in the South Bronx with the local running club "
Black Girls Run" (I cropped them out since I didn't ask if they wanted to be on this post! No offense! It's a really great club with chapters in every city, you should check it out!) This track is where the legend
Ted Corbitt used to run. He's my hero. I am coming back. I will run the Buffalo Marathon on May.
I have already done a 10 mile race and I have a 15k this weekend. I'm not as fast as I was... yet. I still intend to BQ in two years once I'm 35 and it's not as hard. I don't think about what I lost that day very often. I have so much to look forward to now. But, I do feel angry that others will feel the same kind of loss that I had to feel-- and even greater kinds of loss. The kind I can't imagine. All because of cars. All because of cars.